■
BV4501.M8 A28 1897
Murray, Andrew, 1828-1917
Absolute surrender : and
other addresses.
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Fleming H. Revell Company, Publishers.
Absolute Surrender
AND OTHER ADDRESSES
BY
ANDREW MURRAY
"/ am Thine, and all that I have."' i Kings xx, 4.
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY,
New York. Chicago. Toronto.
Publishers of Evangelical Literature.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Absolute Surrender 5
"The Fruit of the Spirit is Love" . . 19
Separated unto the Holy Ghost . . 37
Peter's Repentance . . . . .49
Impossible with Man; Possible with God 58
" O Wretched Man that I am ! " . . .69
" Having Begun in the Spirit " . . 79
Kept by the Power of God . . . .92
"Ye are the Branches" .... 109
Copyrighted 1897, by FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY.
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER.
''And Ben-'hadad the king of Syria gathered all
his host together: and there were thirty and two
kings with him, and horses, and chariots: and he
went up and besieged Samaria, and warred against it.
And he sent messengers to Ahab king of Israel into
the qity, and said unto him, Thus saith Ben hadad,
Thy silver and thy gold is mine; thy wives also and
thy children, even the goodliest, are mine. And the
king of Israel answered and said. My lord, O king,
according to thy saying, I am thine and all that I
have."— i Kings 20:1-4.
What Ben hadad asked was absolute surrender;
and what Ahab gave was what was asked of him —
ahsolide surrender. I want to use these words:
"My lord, O king, according to thy saying, I am
thine, and all that I have," as the words of absolute
surrender with which every child of God ought to
yield himself to his Father. We have heard it before,
but we need to hear it very definitely— the condition
of God's blessing is absolute surrender of all into
His hands. Praise God! if our hearts are willing for
that, there is no end to what God will do for us, and
to the blessing God will bestow.
Absolute sm^render — let me tell you where I got
those words. I used them myself often, and you have
heard them numberless times. But in Scotland once I
was in a company where we were talking about the
condition of Christ's Church, and what the great
5
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
need of the Church and of believers is; and there
was in our company a godly worker who has much to
do in training workers, and I asked him what he
would say was the great need of the Church, and the
message that ought to be preached. He answered
very quietly and simply and determinedly:
" Absolute surrender to God is the one tiling.''^
The words struck me as never before. And that
man began to tell how, in the workers with whom
he had to deal, he finds that if they are sound on
that point, even though they be backward, they are
willing to be taught and helped, and they always im-
prove; whereas others who are not sound there very
often go back and leave the work. The condition
for obtaining God's full blessing is absolute surrender
to Him.
And now, I desire by God's grace to give to you this
message — that your God in heaven answers the
prayers which you have offered for blessing on your-
selves and for blessing on those around you by this
one demand: Are you iciUing to surrender yourselves
absolutely into His hands? What is our answer to
be? God knows there are hundreds of hearts who
have said it, and there are hundreds more who long
to say it but hardly dare to do so. And there are
hearts who have said it, but who have yet miserably
failed, and who feel themselves condemned because
they did not find the secret of the power to live that
life. May God have a word for all!
Let me say, first of all,
GOD CLAIMS IT FROM US.
Yes, it has its foundation in the very nature of God.
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
God cannot do otherwise. Who is God? He is the
Fountain of life, the only Source of existence and
power and goodness, and throughout the universe
there is nothing good but what God works. God has
created the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and the
flowers, and the trees, and the grass; and are they
not all absolutely surrendered to God? Do they not
allow Gc)d to work in them just what He pleases?
When God clothes the lily with its beauty, is it not
yielded up, surrendered, given over to God as He
works in it its beauty ? And God's redeemed children,
oh, can you think that God can work His work if
there is only half or a part of them surrendered?
God cannot do it. God is life, and love, and blessing,
and power, and infinite beauty, and God delights to
communicate Himself to every child who is prepared
to receive Him; but ah! this one want of absolute
surrender is just the thing that hinders God. And
now He comes, and as God He claims it.
You know in daily life what absolute surrender is.
You know that everything has to be given up to its
special, definite object and service. I have a pen in
my pocket, and that pen is absolutely surrendered to
the one work of writing, and that pen must be ab-
solutely surrendered to my hand if I am to write
properly vv^ith it. If another holds it partly, I can-
not write properly. This coat is absolutely given up
to me to cover my body. This building is entirely
given up to religious services. And now, do you ex-
pect that in your immortal being, in the divine
nature that you have received by regeneration, God
can work His work, every day and every hour, unless
you are entirely given up to Him? God cannot.
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
The temple of Solomon was absolutely surrendered to
God when it was dedicated to Him. And every-
one of us is a temple of God, in which God will dwell
and work mightily on one condition — absolute sur-
render to Him. God claims it, God is worthy of it,
and without it God cannot work His blessed work in
us.
But secondly, God not only claims it, but
GOD WILL WOEK IT HIMSELF.
I am sure there is many a heart that says: "Ah, but
that absolute surrender implies so much!" Some-
one says: " Oh, I have passed through so much trial
and suffering, and there is so much of the self-life
still remaining, and I dare not face the entire giving
of it up, because I know it will cause so much trouble
and agony."
Alas! alas ! that God's children have such thoughts
of Him, such cruel thoughts. Oh, I come to you
with a message, fearful and anxious one. God does
not ask you to give the perfect surrender in your
strength, or by the power of your will; God is will-
ing to work it in you. Do we not read: "It is God
that worketh in us, both to will and to do of His
good pleasure " ? And that is what we should seek
for — to go on our faces before God, until our hearts
learn to believe that the everlasting God Himself
will come in to turn out what is wrong, to conquer
what is evil, and to work what is well-pleasing in His
blessed sight. God Himself will work it in you.
Look at the men in the Old Testament, like
Abraham. Do you think it was by accident that God
found that man, the father of the Faithful and the
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
"f^riend of God, and that it was Abraham himself, apart
from God, who had such faith and such obedience
and such devotion? You know it is not so> God
raised him up and prepared him as an instrument for
His glory.
Did not God say to Pharaoh: " For this cause have
I raised thee up, for to show in thee my power"?
And if God said that of him, will not God say it
far more of every child of His?
Oh, I want to encourage you, and I want you to
cast away every fear. Come with that feeble desire;
and if there is the fear which says: "Oh, my
desire is not strong enough, I am not willing
for everything that may come, I do not feel bold
enough to say I can conquer everything" — I pray
you, learn to know and trust your God now. Say:
" My God, I am willing that Thou shouldst make me
willing." If there is anything holding you back, or
any sacrifice you are afraid of making, come to God
now, and prove how gracious your God is, and be
not afraid that He will command from you what He
will not bestow.
God comes and offers to work this absolute sur-
render in you. All these searchings and hungerings
and longings that are in your heart, I tell you they
are the drawings of the divine magnet, Christ Jesus.
He lived a life of absolute surrender, He has got
possession of you. He is living in your heart by His
Holy Spirit. You have hindered and hindered Him
terribly, but He desires to help you to get hold of
Him entirely. And He comes and draws you now by
His message and words. Will you not come and
trust Gjd to work in you that absolute surrender to
10 ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
Himself? Yes, blessed be God, He can do it and He
will do it.
The third thought. God not only claims it and
works it, but
GOD ACCEPTS IT WHEN WE BEING IT TO HIM.
God works it in the secret of our heart, God urges us
by the hidden power of His Holy Spirit to come and
speak it out, and we have to bring and to yield to
Him that absolute surrender. But remember, when
you come and bring God that absolute surrender, it
may, as far as your feelings or your consciousness go,
be a thing of great imperfection, and you may doubt
and hesitate and say:
*'Isit absolute?"
But, oh, remember there was once a man to whom
Christ had said:
" If thou canst believe, all things are possible to
him that believeth."
And his heart was afraid, and he cried out:
" Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief."
That was a faith that triumphed over the devil,
and the evil spirit was cast out. And if you come
and say: "Lord, I yield myself in absolute surrender
to my God," even though it be with a trembling
heart and with the consciousness: " I do not feel the
power, I do not feel the determination, I do not feel
the assurance," it will succeed. Be not afraid, but
come just as you are, and even in the midst of your
trembling the power of the Holy Ghost will work.
Have you never yet learned the lesson that the
Holy Ghost works with mighty power while on the
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER 11
human side everything appears feeble? Look at the
Lord Jesus Christ in Gethsemane. We read that
He, " through the Eternal Spirit," offered Himself
a sacrifice unto God. The Almighty Spirit of God
was enabling Him to do it. And yet what agony
and fear and exceeding sorrow came over Him, and
how He prayed! Externally you can see no sign of
the mighty power of the Spirit, but the Spirit of God
was there. And even so, while you are feeble and
fighting and trembling, in faith in the hidden work
of God's Spirit do not fear, but yield yourself.
And when you do yield yourself in absolute sur-
render, let it be in the faith that God does now
accept of it. That is the great point, and that is
what we so often miss: — that believers should be
thus occupied with God in this matter of surren-
der. I pray you, be occupied with God. We want
to get help, every one of us, so that in our daily
life God shall be clearer to us, God shall have
the right place, and be " all in all." And if we are
to have that through life, let us begin now and look
away from ourselves, and look up to God. Let each
believe, — while I, a poor worm on earth and a trem-
bling child of God, full of failure and sin and fear,
bow here, and no one knows what passes through my
heart, and while I in simplicity say, O God, I accept
Thy terms; I have pleaded for blessing on myself
and others, I have accepted Thy terms of absolute
surrender — while your heart says that in deep si-
lence, remember there is a God present that takes
note of it, and writes it down in His book, and there
is a God present who at that very moment takes pos-
12 ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
session of you. You may not feel it, you may not
realize it, but God takes possession if you will trust
Him.
A fourth thought. God not only claims it, and
works it, and accepts it when I bring it, but
GOD MAINTAINS IT.
That is the great difficulty with many. People
say: "I have often been stirred at a meeting, or at
a convention, and I have consecrated myself to God,
but it has passed away. I know it may last for a
week or for a month, but away it fades, and after a
time it is all gone."
But listen! It is because you do not believe what I
am now going to tell you and remind you of. When
God has begun the work of absolute surrender in
you, and when God has accepted your surrender, then
God holds Himself bound to care for it and to keep
it. Will you believe that?
In this matter of surrender there are two, God and
I — I a worm, God the everlasting and omnipotent
Jehovah. Worm, will you be afraid to trust your-
self to this mighty God now? God is willing. Do
you not believe that He can keep you continually,
day by day, and moment by moment?
Moment by moment I'm kept in His love;
Moment by moment I've life from above.
If God allows the sun to shine upon you moment
by moment, without intermission, will not God let
His life shine upon you every moment? And why
have you not experienced it? Because you have not
trusted God for it, and you do not surrender yourself
absolutely to God in that trust.
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER 13
A life of absolute surrender has its difficulties. I
do not deny that. Yea, it has something far more
than difficulties; it is a life that with men is abso-
lutely impossible. But by the grace of God, by the
power of God, by the power of the Holy Spirit dwell-
ing in us, jt is a life to which we are destined, and a
life that is possible for us, praise God! Let us be-
lieve that God will maintain it.
Some of you read recently the words of that aged
saint who, on his ninetieth birthday, told of all God's
goodness to him — I mean George Mtiller. What did
he say he believed to be the secret of his hapxjiness,
and of all the blessing with which God had visited
him? He said he believed there were two reasons.
The one was that he had been enabled by grace to
maintain a good conscience before God day by day;
the other was, that he was a lover of God's Word.
Ah, yes, a good conscience in unfeigned obedience to
God day by day, and fellowship with God every day
in His Word, and prayer — that is a life of absolute
surrender.
Such a life has two sides — on the one side, abso-
lute surrender to work what God wants you to do;
on the other side, to let God work what He wants
to do.
First, to do what God wants you to do.
Give up yourselves absolutely to the will of God.
You know something of that will; not enough, far
from all. But say absolutely to the Lord God: " By
Thy grace I desire to do Thy will in everything,
every moment of every day." Say: " Lord God, not
a word upon my tongue but for Thy glory, not a
movement of my temper but for Thy glory, not an
14 ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
affection of love or hate in my heart but for Thy
glory, and according to Thy blessed will."
Someone says: "Do you think that possible?"
I ask, What has God promised you, and what can
God do to fill a vessel absolutely surrendered to Him?
Oh, God wants to bless you in a way beyond what
you expect. From the beginning ear hath not heard,
neither hath the eye seen, what God hath prepared
for them that wait for Him. God has prepared
unheard-of things you never can think of; bless-
ings much more wonderful than you can imagine,
more mighty than you can conceive. They are di-
vine blessings. Oh, say now:
" I give myself absolutely to God, to His will, to do
only what God wants."
It is God who will enable you to carry out the sur-
render.
And, on the other side, come and say: *' I give my-
self absolutely to God, to let Him work in me to will
and to do of His good pleasure, as He has promised
to do."
Yes, the living God wants to work in His children
in a way that we cannot understand, but that God's
Word has revealed, and He wants to work in us every
moment of the day. God is willing to maintain our
life. Only let our absolute surrender be one of sim-
ple, childlike, and unbounded trust.
The last thought. This absolute surrender to God
WILL WONDERFULLY BLESS US.
What Ahab said to his enemy. King Ben=hadad, —
" My lord, O king, according to thy word I am thine,
and all that I have " — shall we not say to our God
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER 15
and loving Father? If we do say it, God's blessing
will come upon us. God wants us to be separate
from the world; we are called to come out from the
world that hates God. Come out for God, and say:
"Lord, anything for Thee." If you say that with
prayer, and speak that into God's ear, He will accept
it, and He will teach you what it means.
I say again, God will bless you. You have been
praying for blessing. But do remember, there must
be absolute surrender. At every tea=table you see it.
Why is tea poured into that cup? Because it is
empty, and given up for the tea. But put ink, or
vinegar, or wine into it, and will they pour the tea
into the vessel? And can God fill you, can God bless
you if you are not absolutely surrendered to Him?
He cannot. Let us believe God has wonderful bless-
ings for us, if we will but stand up for God, and say,
be it with a trembling will, yet with a believing
heart:
" O God, I accept Thy demands. I am thine and
all that I have. Absolute surrender is what my soul
yields to Thee by divine grace."
You may not have such strong and clear feelings
of deliverance as you would desire to have, but hum-
ble yourselves in His sight, and acknowledge that
you have grieved the Holy Spirit by your self-will,
self=confidence, and self^elBPort. Bow humbly before
Him in the confession of that, and ask him to break
the heart and to bring you into the dust before Him.
Then, as you bow before Him, just accept God's
teaching that in your flesh " there dwelleth no good
thing," and that nothing will help you except an-
other life which must come in. You must deny self
16 ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
once for all. Denying self must every moment be
the power of your life, and then Christ will come in
and take possession of you.
When was Peter delivered? When was the change
accomplished? The change began with Peter weep-
ing, and the Holy Ghost came down and filled his
heart.
God the Father loves to give us the power of the
Spirit. We have the Spirit of God dwelling within
us. We come to God confessing that, and praising
God for it; and yet confessing how we have grieved
the Spirit. And then we bow our knees to the
Father to ask that He would strengthen us with all
might by the Spirit in the inner man, and that He
would fill us with His mighty power. And as the
Spirit reveals Christ to us, Christ comes to live in
our hearts for ever, and the self4ife is cast out.
Let us bow before God in humiliation, and in that
humiliation confess before Him the state of the
whole Church. No words can tell the sad state of
the Church of Christ on earth. I wish I had words
to speak what I sometimes feel about it. Just think
of the Christians around you. I do not speak of
nominal Christians, or of professing Christians, but
I speak of hundreds and thousands of honest, ear-
nest Christians who are not living a life in the
power of God or to His glory. So little power, so
little devotion or consecration to God, so little con-
ception of the truth that a Christian is a man utter-
ly surrendered to God's will! Oh, we want to con-
fess the sins of God's people around us, and to hum-
ble ourselves. We are members of that sickly body,
and the sickliness of the body will hinder us, and
ABSOLUTE SURRENDER 17
break us down, unless we come to God, and in con-
fession separate ourselves from partnership with
worldliness, with coldness towards each other, unless
we give up ourselves to be entirely and wholly for
God.
How much Christian work is being done in the
spirit of the flesh, and in the power of self! How
much work, day by day, in which human energy —
our will and our thoughts about the work — is contin-
ually manifested, and in which there is but little of
waiting upon God, and upon the power of the Holy
Ghost! Let us make confession. But as we confess
the state of the Church and the feebleness and sin-
fulness of work for God among us, let us come back
to ourselves. Who is there who truly longs to be
delivered from the power of the self4ife, who truly
acknowledges that it is the power of self and the flesh,
and who is willing to cast all at the feet of Christ?
There is deliverance.
I heard of one who had been an earnest Christian,
and who spoke about the " cruel " thought of separa-
tion and death. But you do not think that, do you?
What are we to think of separation and death?
This: — Death was the path to glory for Christ. For
the joy set before Him He endured the cross. The
cross was the birthplace of His everlasting glory.
Do you love Christ? Do you long to be in Christ,
and not like Him? Let death be to you the most
desirable thing on earth ; death to self, and fellowship
with Christ. Separation — do you think it a hard
thing to be called to be entirely free from the world,
and by that separation to be united to God and His
love, by separation to become prepared for living and
18 ABSOLUTE SURRENDER
walking with God every day? Surely one ought to
say:
"Anything to bring me to separation, to death, for
a life of full fellowship with God and Christ."
Oh! come and cast this self -life and flesh-life at
the feet of Jesns. Then trust Him. Do not worry
yourselves with trying to understand all about it, but
come in the living faith that Christ will come into
you with the power of His death and the power of
His life; and then the Holy Spirit will bring the
whole Christ — Christ crucified and Christ risen and
living in glory — into your heart.
"THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE."
I want to look at the fact of a life filled with the
Holy Spirit more from the practical side, and to show
how this life will show itself in our daily walk and
conduct.
Under the Old Testament you know the Holy
Spirit often came upon men as a Divine Spirit of
revelation, to reveal the mysteries of God, or for
power to do the work of God. But He did not then
dwell in them. Now, many just want the Old Testa-
ment gift of power for work, but know very little of
the New Testament gift of the indwelling Spirit, ani-
mating and renewing the whole life. When God
gives the Holy Spirit, His great object is the forma-
tion of a holy character. It is a gift of a holy
mind and spiritual disposition, and what we need
above everything else, is to say:
"I must have the Holy Spirit sanctifying my
whole inner life if I am really to live for God's
glory."
You might say that when Christ promised the
Spirit to the disciples He did so that they might
have power to be witnesses. True, but then they re-
ceived the Holy Ghost in such heavenly power and
reality that He took possession of their whole being
at once and so fitted them as holy men for doing the
work with power as they had to do it. Christ spoke
of power to the disciples, but it was the Spirit filling
their whole being that worked the power.
19
20 ''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE''
I wish now to dwell upon the passage found in
Gal. 5 : 22:
" The fruit of the Spirit is love."
We read that "Love is the fulfilling of the law,"
and my desire is to speak on love as a fruit of the
Spirit with a twofold object. One is that this word
may be a searchlight in our hearts, and give us a test
by which to try all our thoughts about the Holy
Spirit and all our experience of the holy life. Let us
try ourselves by this word. Has this been our daily
habit, to seek the being filled with the Holy Spirit as
the Spirit of love? " The fruit of the Spirit is love."
Has it been our experience that the more we have of
the Holy Spirit the more loving we become? In
claiming the Holy Spirit we should make this the
first object of our expectation. The Holy Spirit
comes as a Spirit of love.
Oh, if this were true in the church of Christ how
different her state would be! May God help us to
get hold of this simple heavenly truth, that the fruit
of the Spirit is a love which appears in the life, and
that just as the Holy Spirit gets real possession of
the life, the heart will be filled wnth real, divine, uni-
versal love.
One of the great causes why God cannot bless His
Church is the luant of love. When the body is di-
vided, there cannot be strength. In the time of their
great religious wars, when Holland stood out so no-
bly against Spain, one of their mottoes was: " Unity
gives strength." It is only when God's people stand
as one body, one before God in the fellowship of love,
one towards another in deep affection, one before the
world in a love that the world can see — it is only then
''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE'' 21
that they will have power to secure the blessing
which they ask of God. Remember that if a vessel
that ought to be one whole is cracked into many
pieces, it cannot be filled. You can take a potsherd,
one ijart of a vessel, and dip out a little water into
that, but if you want the vessel full, the vessel must
be whole. That is literally true of Christ's Church,
and if there is one thing we must pray for still, it is
this: Lord melt us together into one by the power of
the Holy Spirit; let the Holy Spirit, who at Pente-
cost made them ail of one heart and one soul, do His
blessed work among us. Praise God, we can love
each other in a divine love, for " the fruit of the Spirit
is love," Give yourselves up to love, and the Holy
Spirit will come; receive the Spirit, and He will
teach you to love more.
I.
Now, why is it that the fruit of the Spirit is love?
Because God is love.
And what does that mean?
It is the very nature and being of God to delight
in communicating Himself. God has no selfishness,
God keeps nothing to Himself. God's nature is to
be always giving. In the sun and the moon and the
stars, in every flower you see it, in every bird in the
air, in every fish in the sea. God communicates life
to His creatures. And the angels around His throne,
the seraphim and cherubim who are flames of fire —
whence have they their glory? It is because God is
love, and He imparts to them of His brightness and
His blessedness. And we. His redeemed children —
God delights to pour His love into us. And why?
22 " THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE''
Because, as I said, God keeps nothing for Himself.
From eternity God had His only begotten Son, and
the Father gave Him all things, and nothing that
God had was kept back. " God is love."
One of the old Church fathers said that we cannot
better understand the Trinity than as a revelation of
divine love — the Father the loving One, the Fountain
of love; the Son the beloved one, the Keservoir of
love, in whom the love was poured out; and the
Spirit the living love that united both and then over-
flowed into this world. The Spirit of Pentecost, the
Spirit of the Father, and the Spirit of the Son is
love. And when the Holy Spirit comes to us and to
other men, will He be less a Spirit of love than He
is in God? It cannot be; He cannot change His na-
ture. The Spirit of God is love, and " the fruit of
the Spirit is love."
II.
Why is that so? That was the one great need of
mankind, that was the thing which Christ's redemp-
tion came to accomplish: to restore love to this
world.
When man sinned, why was it that he sinned?
Selfishness triumphed — he sought self instead of
God. And just look! Adam at once begins to accuse
the woman of having led him astray. Love to God
had gone, love to man was lost. Look again: of the
first two children of Adam, the one becomes a mur-
derer of his brother.
Does not that teach us that sin had robbed the
world of love ? Ah ! what a proof the history of the
world has been of love having been lost! There may
" THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE'' 23
have been beautiful examples of love even among the
heathen, but only as a little remnant of what was
lost. One of the worst things sin did for man was to
make him selfish, for selfishness cannot love.
The Lord Jesus Christ came down from heaven as
the Son of God's love. " God so loved the world that
He gave His only begotten Son." God's Son came
to show what love is, and He lived a life of love here
upon earth in fellowship with His disciples, in com-
passion over the poor and miserable, in love even to
His enemies, and He died the death of love. And
when He went to heaven, whom did He send down?
The Spirit of love, to come and banish selfishness
and envy and pride, and bri ng the love of God into
the hearts of men. " The fruit of the Spirit is love."
And what was the preparation for the promise of
the Holy Spirit? You know that promise as found
in the fourteenth chapter of John's gospel. But re-
member what precedes, in the thirteenth chapter.
Before Christ promised the Holy Si3irit He gave a
new commandment, and about that new command-
ment He said wonderful things. One thing was:
" Even as I have loved you, so love ye one another."
To them His dying love was to be the only law of
their conduct and intercourse with each other.
What a message to those fishermen, to those men full
of pride and selfishness! "Learn to love each
other," said Christ, " as I have loved you." And by
the grace of God they did it. When Pentecost came
they were of one heart and one soul. Christ did it
for them.
And now He calls us to dwell and to walk in love.
He demands that though a man hate you, still you
24 ''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE''
love him. True love cannot be conquered by any-
thing in heaven or upon the earth. The more hatred
there is, the more love triumphs through it all and
shows its true nature. This is the love that Christ
commanded His disciples to exercise,
What more did He say? "By this shall all men
know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to
another,"
You all know what it is to wear a badge. Many of
you wear a blue ribbon badge, and everybody knows
what that means. And Christ said to His disciples
in effect:
" I give you a badge, and that badge is
LOVE.
That is to be your mark. It is the only thing in
heaven or on earth by which men can know me."
Oh! do not we begin to fear that love has fled from
the earth? That if we were to ask the world: "Have
you seen us wear the badge of love?" the world would
say: "No; what we have heard of the Church of
Christ is that there is not a place where there is no
quarreling and separation." Let us ask God with one
heart that we may wear the badge of Jesus' love.
God is able to give it.
III.
" The fruit of the Spirit is love." Why? Be-
cause nothing hut love can expel and conquer our
selfishness.
Self is the great curse, whether in its relation to
God, or to our fellow men in general, or to fellow^
Christians; thinking of ourselves and seeking our
''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE'' 25
own. Self is our greatest curse. But, praise God,
Christ came to redeem us from self. We sometimes
talk about deliverance from the self^life — and thank
Grod for every word that can be said about it to help
us — but I am afraid some people think deliverance
from the 6elf4ife means that now they are going to
have no longer any trouble in serving God; and they
forget that deliverance from selfdife means to be a
vessel overflowing with love to everybody all the day.
And there you have the reason why many people
pray for the j^ower of the Holy Ghost, and they get
something, but oh, so little! because they prayed for
power for work, and power for blessing, but they
have not prayed for power for full deliverance from
self. That means not only the righteous self in inter-
course with God, but the unloving self in intercourse
with men. And there is deliverance. " The fruit of
the Spirit is love." I bring you the glorious promise
of Christ that He is able to fill our hearts with
love.
A great many of us try hard at times to love. We
try to force ourselves to love, and I do not aay that is
wrong; it is better than nothing. But the end of it
is always very sad. '' I fail continually," such an one
must confess. And v/hat is the reason? The reason
is simply this: Because they have never ^.earned to
believe and accept the truth that the Holy 1 Spirit can
pour God's love into their heart. That bh^isod text;
often it has been limited! — "The love of Go4 is shed
abroad in our hearts." It has often been understood
in this sense: It means the love of God to iw^^ Oh,
what a limitation! That is only the beginning. The
love of God is always the love of God in its '^ii*;Wty,
26 " THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE''
in its fulness as an indwelling power, a love of
God to me that leaps back to Him in love, and
overflows to my fellow men in love — God's love to
me, and my love to God, and my love to my fellow
men. The three are one; you cannot separate them.
Do believe that the love of God can be shed abroad
in your heart and mine so that we can love all the
day.
"Ah!" you say, "how little I have understood
that!"
Why is a lamb always gentle? Because that is its
nature. Does it cost the lamb any trouble to be
gentle? No. Why not? It is so beautiful and
gentle. Has a lamb to study to be gentle? No.
Why does that come so easy? It is its nature. And
a wolf — why does it cost a wolf no trouble to be
cruel, and to put its fangs into the poor lamb or
sheep? Because that is its nature. It has not to
summon up its courage; the wolf-nature is there.
And how can I learn to love? Never until the
Spirit of God fills my heart with God's love, and I
begin to long for God's love in a very different
sense from which I have sought it so selfishly, as
a comfort and a joy and a happiness and a pleas-
ure to myself; never until I begin to learn that
" God is love," and to claim it, and receive it as an
indvrelling power for self-sacrifice; never until I be-
gin to see that my glory, my blessedness, is to be
like God and like Christ, in giving up everything in
myself for my fellow-men. May God teach us that!
Oh, the divine blessedness of the love with which the
Holy Spirit can fill our hearts! "The fruit of the
Spirit is love."
''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE'' 21
IV.
Once again I ask, Why must this be so? And my
answer is: Without this we cannot live the daily life
of love.
How often, when we speak about the consecrated
life, we have to speak about temper, and some people
have sometimes said:
"You make too much of temper."
I do not think we can make too much of it. Do
you see yonder clock? You know what those hands
mean. The hands tell me what is within the clock,
and if I see that the hands stand still, and that the
hands point wrong, and that the clock is slow or fast,
I say that there is something inside the clock that is
wrong. And temper is just like the revelation that
the clock gives of what is within. Temper is a proof
whether the love of Christ is filling the heart, or not.
How many there are who find it easier in church, or
in the prayer-meeting, or in work for the Lord, dili-
gent, earnest work, to be holy and happy than in the
daily life with wife and children and servant; easier
to be holy and happy outside the home than in it.
Where is the love of God ? In Christ. God has pre-
pared for us a wonderful redemption in Christ, and
He longs to make something supernatural of us.
Have we learned to long for it, and ask for it, and
expect it in its fulness?
Then there is the tongue! We sometimes speak
of the tongue when we talk of the better life and the
restful life, but just think what liberty many Chris-
tians give to their tongues. They say:
" I have a right to think what I like,"
28 " THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE"
When they speak about each other, when they
speak about their neighbors, when they speak about
other Christians, how often there are sharp remarks!
God keep me from saying anything that would be
unloving; God shut my mouth if I am not to speak
in tender love. But what I am saying is a fact.
How often there is found among Christians who are
banded together in work, sharp criticism, sharp judg-
ment, hasty opinion, unloving words, secret contempt
of each other, secret condemnation of each other.
Oh, just as a mother's love covers her children and
delights in them and has the tenderest compassion
with their foibles or failures, so there ought to be in
the heart of every believer a motherly love toward
every brother and sister in Christ: Have you aimed
at that? Have you sought it? Have you ever
pleaded for it? Jesus Christ said: " As I have loved
you . . . love one another." And He did not
put that among the other commandments, but He said
in effect:
" That is a new commandment, the one command-
ment: Love one another as I have loved you."
It is in our daily life and conduct that the fruit of
the Spirit is love. From that there comes all the
graces and virtues in which love is manifested: joy,
peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness; no sharp-
ness or hardness in your tone, no unkindness or self-
ishness; meekness before God and man. You see
that all these are the gentler virtues. I have often
thought as I read those words in Colossians, " Put on
therefore as the elect of God, holy and beloved,
bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind,
meekness, longsuffering," that if we had written, we
''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE'' 29
should have put in the foreground the manly virtues,
such as zeal, courage and diligence; but we need to
see how the gentler, the most womanly virtues are
specially connected with dependence upon the Holy
Spirit. These are indeed heavenly graces. They
never were found in the heathen world. Christ was
needed to come from heaven to teach us. Your
blessedness is longsuffering, meekness, kindness;
your glory is humility before God. The fruit of the
Spirit, that He brought from heaven out of the
heart of the crucified Christ, and that He gives in
our heart, is first and foremost — love.
You know what John says: "No man hath seen
God at any time. If we love one another, God
dwelleth in us." That is, I cannot see God, but as
a compensation I can see my brother, and if I love
him God dwells in me. Is that really true? That I
cannot see God, but I must love my brother, and
God will dwell in me? Loving my brother is the
w^ay to real fellowshij) with God. You know what
John further says in that most solemn test, 1 John,
4 : 20 : " If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother,
he is a liar; for he that loveth not his brother whom
he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath
not seen?" There is a brother, a most unlovable
man. He worries you every time you meet him.
He is of the very opposite disposition to yours. You
are a careful business man, and you have to do with
him in your business. He is most untidy, un-
businesS'like. You say:
" I cannot love him."
Oh friend, you have not learned the lesson that
Christ wanted to teach above everything. Let a
30 ''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE''
man be what he will, you are to love him. Love is
to be the fruit of the Spirit all the day and every
day. Yes, listen! if a man loves not his brother
whom he hath seen, if you don't love that unlovable
man whom you have seen, how can you love God
whom you have not seen? You can deceive your-
self with beautiful thoughts about loving God. You
must prove your love to God by your love to your
brother; that is the one standard by which God will
judge your love to Him. If the love of God is in
your heart you will love your brother. The fruit of
the Spirit is love.
And what is the reason that God's Holy Spirit
cannot come in power? Is it not possible?
You remember the comparison I used in speaking
of the vessel. I can dip a little water into a potsherd,
a bit of a vessel; but if a vessel is to be full it must
be unbroken. And the children of God, wherever
they come together, to whatever church or mission
or society they belong, must love each other in-
tensely, or the Spirit of God cannot do His work.
We talk about grieving the Spirit of God by worldli-
ness and ritualism and formality and error and in-
difference, but, I tell you, the one thing above every-
thing that grieves God's Spirit is this want of love.
Let every heart search itself, and ask that God may
search it.
Why are we taught that " the fruit of the Spirit is
love"? Because the Spirit of God has come to make
our daily life an exhibition of divine poicer and a
revelation of what God can do for His children.
" THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE'' 31
In the second and the fourth chapters of Acts we
read that the disciples were of one heart and of one
soul. During the three years they had walked with
Christ they never had been in that spirit. All
Christ's teaching could not make them of one heart
and one soul. But the Holy Spirit came from heaven
and shed the love of God in their hearts, and they
were of one heart and one soul. The same Holy
Spirit that brought the love of heaven into their
hearts must fill us too. Nothing less will do. Even
as Christ did, one might preach love for three years
with^he tongue of an angel, but that would not
teach any man to love unless the power of the Holy
Spirit should come upon him to bring the love of
heaven into his heart.
Think of the Church at large. What divisions!
Think of the different bodies. Take the question of
holiness, take the question of the cleansing blood,
take the question of the baptism of the Spirit — what
differences are caused among dear believers by such
questions! That there should be
DIFFERENCES OF OPINION
does not trouble me. We have not all got the same
constitution and temperament and mind. But how
often hate, bitterness, contempt, separation, unlov-
ingness, are caused by the holiest truths of God's
Word! Our doctrines, our creeds, have been more
important than love. We often think we are valiant
for the truth, and we forget God's command to speak
the truth m love. And it was so in the time of the
Reformation between the Lutheran and Calvinistic
churches. What bitterness there was then in regard
32 ''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE''
to the Holy Supper, wliicli was meant to be tlie bond
of union between all believers! And so, down the
ages, the very dearest truths of God have become
mountains that have separated us.
If we want to pray in power, and if we want to
expect the Holy Spirit to come down in power, and
if we want indeed that God shall pour out His Spirit,
we must enter into a covenant with God that we love
one another with a heavenly love.
Are you ready for that? Only that is true love
that is large enough to take in all God's children, the
most unloving and unlovable, and unworthy, and
unbearable, and trying. If my vow — absolute sur-
render to God — was true, then it must mean absolute
surrender to the divine love to fill me; to be a servant
of love to love every child of God around me. " The
fruit of the Spirit is love."
Oh, God did something wonderful when He gave
Christ, at His right hand, the Holy Spirit to come
down out of the heart of the Father and His everlast-
ing love. And how we have degraded the Holy
Spirit into a mere power by which we have to do
our work! God forgive us. Oh that the Holy Spirit
might be held in honor as a power to fill us with the
very life and nature of God and of Christ!
VI.
"The fruit of the Spirit is love." I ask once
again. Why is it so? And the answer comes: That
is the only power in which Christians really can do
their work.
Yes, it is that we need. We want not only love
that is to bind us to each other, but we want a divine
" THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE'' 33
love in our work for the lost around us. Oh, do we
not often undertake a great deal of work just as men
undertake work of philanthropy, from a natural spirit
of comjpassion for our fellow^men? Do we not often
undertake Christian work because our minister or
friend calls to it? and do we not often perform Chris-
tian work with a certain zeal but without having had
a baptism of love?
People often ask: " What is the baptism of fire?"
I have answered more than once: I know no fire
like the fire of God, the fire of everlasting love that
consumed the sacrifice on Calvary. The baptism of
love is what the Church needs, and to get that we
must begin at once to get down upon our faces be-
fore God in confession, and plead:
" Lord, let love from heaven flow down into my
heart. I am giving up my life to pray and live as
one who has given himself up for the everlasting
love to dwell in and fill him."
Ah yes, if the love of God were in our hearts, what
a difference it would make! There are hundreds of
believers who say:
" I work for Christ, and I feel I could work much
more, but I have not the gift. I do not know how or
where to begin. I do not know what I can do."
Brother, sister, ask God to baptize you with the
Spirit of love, and love will find its way. Love is a
fire that will burn through every difficulty. You
may be a shy, hesitating man, who cannot speak well,
but love can burn through everything. God fill us
with love! We need it for our work.
You have read many a touching story of love ex-
pressed, and you have said. How beautiful ! I heard
34 " THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE''
one not long ago. A lady had been asked to speak at
a. Rescue Home where there were a number of poor
women. As she arrived there and got to the window
with the matron, she saw outside a wretched object
sitting, and asked:
"Who is that?"
The matron answered: " She has been into the
house thirty or forty times, and she has always gone
away again. Nothing can be done with her, she is so
low and hard."
But the lady said: " She must come in."
The matron then said: " We have been waiting for
you, and the company is assembled, and you have
only an hour for the address."
The lady replied: " No, this is of more importance ";
and she went outside where the woman was sitting,
and said:
"My sister, what is the matter?"
"I am not your sister," was the reply.
Then the lady laid her hand on her, and said:
"Yes, I am your sister, and I love you"; and so she
spoke until the heart of the poor woman was touched,
The conversation lasted some time, and the com-
pany were waiting patiently. Ultimately the lady
brought the woman into the room. There was the
poor wretched, degraded creature, full of shame. She
would not sit on a chair, but sat down on a stool be-
side the speaker's seat, and she let her lean against
her, with her arms around the poor woman's neck,
while she spoke to the assembled people. And that
love touched the woman's heart; she had found one
who really loved her, and that love gave access to the
love of Jesus.
•' THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE'' 35
Praise God! there is love upon earth in the hearts
of God's children; but oh, that there were more!
0 God, baptize our ministers with a tender love,
and our missionaries, and our colporters, and our
Bible-readers, and our workers, and our young men's
and young women's associations. Oh that God
would begin with us now, and baptize us with heaven-
ly love !
VII.
Once again. It is only love that can fit us for the
work of intercession.
1 have said that love must fit us for our work. Do
you know what the hardest and the most important
work is that has to be done for this sinful world? It
is the work of intercession, the work of going to God
and taking time to lay hold on Him.
A man may be an earnest Christian, an earnest
minister, and a man may do good, but alas! how often
he has to confess that he knows but little of what it
is to tarry with God! May God give us the great
gift of an intercessory spirit, a spirit of prayer and
supplication! Let me ask you in the name of Jesus
not to let a day pass without praying for all saints,
and for all God's people.
I find there are Christians who think little of that.
I find there are prayer^unions where they pray for the
members, and not for all believers. I pray you, take
time to pray for the Church of Christ. It is right to
pray for the heathen, as I have already said. God
help us to pray more for them. It is rig\t to pray for
missionaries and for evangelistic work, aid for the
unconverted. But Paul did not tell peopl. to pray
30 ''THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS LOVE''
for the heathen or the unconverted. Paul told them
to pray for believers. Do make this your first prayer
every day:
"loed, bless thy saints everywheee."
The state of Christ's Church is indescribably low.
Plead for God's people that He would visit them,
plead for each other, plead for all believers who are
trying to work for God. Let love fill your heart. Ask
Christ to pour it out afresh into you every day. Try
to get it into you by the Holy Spirit of God: I am
separated unto the Holy Spirit, and the fruit of the
Spirit is love. God heli^ us to understand it.
May God grant that we learn day by day to wait
more quietly upon Him, Do not wait upon God only
for ourselves, or the power to do so will soon be lost;
but give ourselves up to the ministry and the love of
intercession, and pray more for God's people, for
God's people round about us for the Spirit of love in
ourselves and in them, and for the work of God we
are connected with; and the answer will surely come,
and our waiting upon God will be a source of untold
blessing and power. " The fruit of the Spirit is
love."
Have you a lack of love to confess before God?
Then make confession and say before Him; "O Lord,
my want of heart, my want or love — I confess it."
And then, as you cast that want at His feet, believe
that the blood cleanses you, that Jesus comes in His
mighty cleansing, saving power to deliver you, and
that He will '^ive His Holy Spirit.
SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST.
"Now there were in the church that was at Antioch
certain prophets and teachers; as Barnabas, and Sim-
eon that was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and
and Manaen . . . and Saul.
"As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the
Holy Ghost said. Separate me Barnabas and Saul for
the work whereunto I have called them.
" And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid
their hands on them, they sent them away. So they,
being sent forth by the Holy Ghost, departed unto
Seleucia." — Acts xiii. 1-4.
In the story of our text we shall find some precious
thoughts to guide us as to what God would have of
us, and what God would do for us. The great lesson
of the verses quoted is this: TJie Holy Gliost is
the director of the loork of God upon the earth. And
what we should do if we are to work rightly for God,
and if God is to bless our work, is to see that we
stand in a right relation to the Holy Ghost, that we
give Him every day the place of honor that belongs
to Him, and that in all our work and (what is more)
in all our private inner life, the Holy Ghost shall al-
ways have the first place. Let me point out to you
some of the precious thoughts our passage suggests.
And, first of all, we see that God has His own
plans tvith regard to His hincjdom.
His church at Antioch had been established. God
37
38 SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST
had certain plans and intentions with regard to Asia,
and with regard to Europe. He had conceived them ;
they were His, and He made them known to His serv-
ants.
Our great Commander organizes every campaign,
and His generals and officers do not always know the
great plans. They often receive sealed orders, and they
have to wait on Him for what He gives them as orders.
God in heaven has wishes, and a will, in regard to any
work that ought to be done, and to the way in which
it has to be done. Blessed is the man who gets into
God's secrets and works under God.
Some years ago, at Wellington, South Africa,
where I live, we opened a Mission Institute — what
is counted there a fine large building. At our open-
ing services the Principal said something that I
have never forgotten. He remarked:
" Last year we gathered here to lay the foundation^
stone, and what was there then to be seen? Nothing
but rubbish, and stones, and bricks, and ruins of an
old building that had been pulled dow^n. There we
laid the foundation-stone, and very few knew what
the building was that was to rise. No one knew it
perfectly in every detail except one man, the archi-
tect. In his mind it was all clear, and as the con-
tractor and the mason and the carpenter came to
their work they took their orders from him, and the
humblest laborer had to be obedient to orders, and
the structure rose, and this beautiful building has
been completed. And just so," he added, " this
building that we open to-day is but laying the foun-
dation of a work of which only God knows what is
to become."
SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST 39
But God has His workers and His plans clearly
mapped out, and our position is to wait, that God
should communicate to us as much of His will as
each time is needful.
We have simply to be faithful in obedience, car-
rying out His orders. God has a plan for His Church
upon earth. But alas! we too often make our plan,
and we think that we know what ought to be done.
We ask God fii'st to bless our feeble efforts, instead
of absolutely refusing to go unless God go before
us. God has planned for the work and the extension
of His kingdom. The Holy Ghost has had that work
given in charge to Him. " The work whereunto I
have called them." May God therefore help us all
to be afraid of touching " the ark of God " except
as we are led by the Holy Ghost.
Then the second thought: — God is imlling and
able to reveal to His servants what His will is.
Yes, blessed be God, communications come down
from heaven still! As we read here what the Holy
Ghost said, so still the Holy Ghost will speak to
His Church and His people. In these later days He
has often done it. He has come to individual men,
and by His divine teaching He has led them out
into fields of labor that others could not at first un-
derstand or approve; into ways and methods that
did not recommend themselves to the majority. But
the Holy Ghost does still in our time teach His peo-
ple. Thank God, in our foreign missionary societies
and in our home missions, and in a thousand forms
of work, the guiding of the Holy Ghost is known,
but (we are all ready, I think, to confess) too little
known. We have not learned enough to wait upon
40 SEr ABATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST
Him, and so we should make a solemn declaration
before God: O God, we want to wait more for Thee
to show us Thy will.
Do not ask God only for power. Many a Chris-
tian has his own plan of working, but God must
send the power. The man works in his own will,
and God must give the grace — the one reason why
God often gives so little grace and so little success.
But let us all take our place before God and say:
" What is done in the will of God the strength of
God will not be withheld from it; what is done in
the will of God must have the mighty bfessing of
God."
And so let our first desire be to have the will of God
revealed.
If you ask me, is it an easy thing to get these
communications from heaven, and to understand
them? I can give you the ansvrer. It is easy to
those who are in right fellowship with heaven, and
who understand
THE ART OF WAITING UPON GOD.
How often we ask: How can a person know the
will of God? And people want, when they are in
perplexity, to pray very earnestly that God should
answer them at once. But God can only reveal His
will to a heart that is humble and tender and empty.
God can only reveal His will in perplexities and
special difficulties to a heart that has learned to obey
and honor Him loyally in little things and in daily
life.
That brings me to the ihird thought: — Noie the
disposition to ivhich the Spirit revecds God^s will.
What do we read here? There were a number of
SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST 41
men ministering to the Lord and fasting, and the
Holy Ghost came and spoke to them. Some people
understand this passage very much as they would in
reference to a missionary committee of our day. We
see there is an open field, and we have had our mis-
sions in other fields, and we are going to get on to
that field. We have virtually settled that, and we
pray about it. But the position was a very different
one in those former days. I doubt whether any of
them thought of Europe, for later on even Paul
himself assayed to go back into Asia, till the night
vision called him by the will of God. Look at those
men. God had done wonders. He had extended the
Church to Antioch, and He had given rich and large
blessing. Now, here were these men ministering to the
Lord, serving Him with prayer and fasting. What
a deep conviction they have — " It must all come di-
rect from heaven. We are in fellowship with the
risen Lord; we must have a close union with Him,
and somehow He will let us know what He wants."
And there they were, empty, ignorant, helpless, glad
and j'oyful, but deeply humbled.
*' O Lord," they seem to say, " we are Thy servants,
and in fasting and prayer we wait upon Thee. What
isThy willfor us?"
Was it not the same with Peter? He was on the
housetop, fasting aud jDraying, and little did he think
of the vision and the command to go to Csesarea.
He was ignorant of what his work might be.
It is in hearts entirely surrendered to the Lord
Jesus, in hearts separating themselves from the world,
and even from ordinary religious exercises, and giv-
ing themselves up in intense prayer to look to their
42 SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST
Lord — it is in such hearts that the heavenly will
of God will be made manifest.
You know that word " fasting " occurs a second
time (in the third verse): " They fasted and prayed."
When you pray, you love to go into your closet, ac-
cording to the command of Jesus, and shut the door.
You shut out business and company and pleasure and
anything that can distract, and you want to be alone
with God. But in one shape even the material world
follows you there. You must eat. These men wanted
to shut themselves out from the influences of the ma-
terial and the visible, and they fasted. What they
ate was simply enough to supply the wants of nature,
and in the intensity of their souls they thought to
give expression to their letting-go of everything on
earth, in their fasting before God. Oh, may God
give us that intensity of desire, that separation from
everything, because we want to wait upon God, that
the Holy Ghost may reveal to us God's blessed will.
The fourth thought. What is now the will of God
as the Holy Ghost reveals it? It is contained in one
word: Separaiio7i unto the Holy Ghost. That is
THE KEYNOTE OF THE MESSAGE FEOM HEAVEN.
" Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work
whereunto I have called them. The work is mine,
and I care for it, and I have chosen these men and
called them, and I want you who represent the
Church of Christ ujDon earth, to set them apart unto
me."
Look at this heavenly message in its twofold as-
pect. The men were to be set apart to the Holy
Ghost, and the Church was to do this separating
SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST 43
loork. The Holy Ghost could trust these men to do
it in a right spirit. There they were abiding in fel-
lowship with the heavenly, and the Holy Ghost could
say to them, Do the work of separating these men.
And these were the men the Holy Ghost had pre-
pared, and He could say of them, Let them be sepa-
rated unto me.
Here we come to the very root, to the very life of
the need of Christian workers. The question is:
What is needed that the power of God should rest
upon us more mightily, that the blessing of God
should be poured out more abundantly among those
poor wretched people and perishing sinners among
whom we labor? And the answer from heaven is:
" I want men separated unto the Holy Ghost."
What does that imply ? You know that there are
two spirits on earth. Christ said, when He spoke
about the Holy Spirit: "The world cannot receive
Him." Paul said: " We have received not the spirit
of the world, but the Spirit that is of God." That is
the great want in every worker — the spirit of the
world going out, and the Spirit of God coming in to
take possession of the inner life, and of the whole
being.
I am sure there are workers who often cry to God
for the Holy Spirit to come upon them as a Spirit of
power for their work, and when they feel that meas-
ure of power, and get blessing, they thank God for it.
But God wants something more and something
higher. God wants us to seek for the Holy Spirit as
a Spirit of power in our own heart and life, to con-
quer self and cast out sin, and work the blessed and
beautiful image of Jesus into us.
41 SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST
There is a difference between the power of the
Spirit as a gift, and the power of the Spirit for the
grace of a holy life. A man may often have a meas-
ure of the power of the Spirit, but if there be not a
large measure of the Spirit as the Spirit of grace and
holiness, the defect will be manifest in his work. He
may be made the means of conversion, but he never
will help people on to a higher standard of spiritual
life, and when he passes away a great deal of his
work may pass away too. But a man who is sepa-
rated unto the Holy Ghost is a man who is given up
to say:
" Father, let the Holy Ghost have full domin-
ion^ over me, in my home, in my temper, in every
word of my tongue, in every thought of my heart, in
every feeling towards my fellow men; let the Holy
Spirit have entire possession."
Is that what has been the longing and the cove-
nant of your heart with your God — to be a man or a
woman separated and given up unto the Holy Ghost?
I pray you listen to the voice of heaven. " Separate
me," said the Holy Ghost. Yes, separated unto the
Holy Ghost. May God grant that the Word may
enter into the very depths of our being to search us,
and if we discover that we have not come out from
the world entirely, if God discovers to us that the
selfdife, self-will, self^exaltation are there, let us
humble ourselves before Him.
Man, woman, brother, sister, you are a worker sep-
arated unto the Holy Ghost. Is that true? Has
that been your longing desire? Has that been your
surrender? Has that been what you have expected
through faith in the power of our risen and almighty
SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST 45
Lord Jesus? If not, here is the call of faith, and
here is the key of blessing — separated unto the Holy
Ghost. God write the word in our hearts!
I said the Holy Spirit spoke to that church as a
church capable of doing that work. The Holy Spirit
trusted them. God grant that our churches, our
missionary societies, and our workers' unions, that all
our directors and councils and committees may be
men and women who are fit for the icork of separat-
ing ivorkers unto the Holy Spirit. We can ask God
for that too.
Then comes my fifth thought, and it is this; —
This holy partnership ivith the Holy Spirit in His
work becomes a ^natter of consciousness and of
action.
These men, what did they do? They set apart Paul
and Barnabas, and then it is written of the two that
they, being sent forth by the Holy Ghost, went down
to Seleucia. Oh, what fellowship! The Holy Spirit
in heaven doing part of the work, man on earth
doing the other part. After the ordination of the
men upon earth, it is written in God's inspired Word
that they were sent forth by the Holy Ghost.
And see how this partnership calls to new prayer
and fasting. They had for a certain time been min-
istering to the Lord and fasting, perhaps days; and
the Holy Spirit speaks, and they have to do the work
and to enter into partnership, and at once they come
together for more prayer and fasting. That is the
spirit in which they obey the command of their
Lord. And that teaches us that it is not only in the
beginning of our Christian work, but all along, that
we need to have our strength in prayer. If there is
46 SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST
one thought with regard to the Church of Christ,
which at times comes to me with overwhelming sor-
row; if there is one thought, in regard to my own
life, of which I am ashamed; if there is one thought
of which I feel that the Church of Christ has not
accepted it and not grasped it; if there is one thought
which makes me pray to God: " Oh, teach us by Thy
grace, new things " — it is the
WONDERFUL POWER THAT PRAYER IS MEANT TO HAVE
in the kingdom. We have so little availed ourselves
of it.
We have all read the expression of Christian in
Bunyan's great work, when he found he had the key
in his breast that should unlock the dungeon. We
have the key that can unlock the dungeon of atheism
and of heathendom. But, oh! we are far more oc-
cupied with our work than we are with prayer. We
believe more in speaking to men than we believe in
speaking to God. Learn from these men that the
work which the Holy Ghost commands must call us
to new fasting and prayer, to new separation from
the spirit and the pleasures of the world, to new con-
secration to God and to His fellowship. Those men
gave themselves up to fasting and prayer, and if
in all our ordinary Christian work there were more
prayer there would be more blessing in our own
inner life. If we felt and proved and testified to the
world that our only strength lay in keeping every
minute in contact with Christ, every minute allowing
God to work in us — if that were our spirit, would
not, by the grace of God, our lives be holier? Would
not they be more abundantly fruitful?
StlP ABATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST il
I hardly know a more solemn warning in God's
Word than that which we find in the third chapter of
Galatians, where Paul asked:
" Having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made
perfect by the flesh? "
Do you understand what that means? A terrible
danger in Christian work, just as in a Christian life
that is begun with much prayer, begun in the Holy
Spirit, is that it may be gradually shunted off on to
the lines of the flesh; and the word comes: " Having
begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the
flesh?" In the time of our first perplexity and
helplessness we prayed much to God, and God an-
swered and God blessed, and our organization became
perfected, and our band of workers became large;
but gradually the organization and the work and the
rush have so got possesion of us that the power of
the Spirit, in which we began when we were a small
company, has almost been lost. Oh, I pray you, note
it well! It was with new prayer and fasting, with
more prayer and fasting, that this company of dis-
ciples carried out the command of the Holy Ghost.
" My soul, wait thou only upon God." That is our
highest and most important work. The Holy Spirit
comes in answer to believing prayer.
You know when the exalted Jesus had ascended to
the throne, for ten days the footstool of the throne
was the place where His waiting disciples cried to
Him. And that is the law of the kingdom — the
King upon the throne, the servants upon the foot-
stool. May God find us there unceasingly!
Then comes the last thought:— TF/ia^ a wonderful
blessing comes when the Holy Ghost is allowed to
48 SEPARATED UNTO THE HOLY GHOST
lead and to direct the work, and when it is carried
on in obedience to Him!
You know the story of the mission on which
Barnabas and Saul were sent out. You know what
power there was with them. The Holy Ghost sent
them, and they went on from place to place with large
blessing. The Holy Ghost was their leader further
on. You recollect how it was by the Spirit that Paul
was hindered from going again into Asia, and was
led away over to Europe. Oh, the blessing that rest-
ed upon that little company of men, and upon their
ministry unto the Lord!
I pray you, let us learn to believe that God has a
blessing for us. The Holy Ghost, into whose hands
God has put the work, has been called " the executive
of the Holy Trinity." The Holy Ghost has not only
power, but He has the Spirit of love. He is brood-
ing over this dark world, and every sphere of work
in it, and He is willing to bless. And why is there
not more blessing? There can be but one answer.
We have not honored the Holy Ghost as we should
have done. Is there one who can say that that is
not true? Is not every thoughtful heart ready to
cry: "God forgive me that I have not honored the
Holy Spirit as I should have done, that I have grieved
Him, that I have allowed self and the flesh and my
own will to work where the Holy Ghost should have
been honored! May God forgive me that I have al-
lowed self and the flesh and the will actually to have
the place that God wanted the Holy Ghost to get."
Oh, the sin is greater than we know! No wonder
that there is so much feebleness and failure in the
Church of Christ!
PETER'S REPENTANCE.
"And the Lord turned and looked upon Peter.
And Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how
He had said unto him, Before the cock crow, thou
shalt deny me thrice. And Peter went out, and wept
bitterly."— jLtt/ce 22 : 61, 62.
That was the turning-point in the history of Peter.
Christ had said to him: "Thou canst not follow me
now." Peter was not in a fit state to follow Christ,
because he had not been brought to an end of him-
self; he did not know himself, and he therefore could
not follow Christ. But when he went out and wept
bitterly, then came the great change. Christ pre-
viously said to him: "When thou art converted,
strengthen thy brethren." Here is the point where
Peter was converted from self to Christ.
I thank God for the story of Peter. I do not know
a man in the Bible who gives us greater comfort.
When we look at his character, so full of failures, and
at what Christ made him by the power of the Holy
Ghost, there is hope for every one of us. But re-
member, before Christ could fill Peter with the Holy
Spirit, and make a new man of him, he had to go out
and weep bitterly; he had to be humbled. If we
want to understand this, I think there are four points
that we must look at. First, let us look at Peter the
devoted disciple of Jesus; next, at Peter as he lived
the life of self ; then at Peter in his repentance; and,
49
50 PETER'S REPENTANCE
lastly, at ivhat Christ made of Peier hy the Holy
Spirit.
1. First, then, look at
PETER THE DEVOTED DISCIPLE OF CHRIST.
Christ called Peter to forsake his nets and follow
Him. Peter did it at once, and he afterwards could
say rightly to the Lord:
" We have forsaken all and followed Thee."
Peter was a man of absolute surrender; he gave up
all to follow Jesus. Peter was also a man of ready
obedience. You remember Christ said to him:
" Launch out into the deep, and let down the net."
Peter the fisherman knew there were no fish there,
for they had been toiling all night and had caught
nothing; but he said: " At Thy word I will let down
the net." He submitted to the w^ord of Jesus. Fur-
ther, he was a man of great faith When he saw
Christ walking on the sea, he said: " Lord, if it be
Thou, bid me come unto Thee "; and at the voice of
Christ he stepped out of the boat and walked upon
the water. And Peter was a man of spiritual insight.
When Christ asked the disciples: "Whom do ye say
that I am?" Peter was able to answer: ''Thou art
the Christ, the Son of the living God." And Christ
said: "Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona; for flesh
and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my
Father which is in heaven." And Christ spoke of
him as the i^ock man, and of his having the keys of
the kingdom. Peter was a splendid man, a devoted
disciple of Jesus, and if he was living nowadays,
everybody would say that he was an advanced Chris-
tian. And yet how much there was wanting in
Peter I
PETERS REPENTANCE 51
2. Look next at
PETER LIVING THE LIFE OF SELF,
pleasing self, and trusting self, and seeking the honor
of self.
You recollect that just after Christ had said to
him: "Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto
thee, but my Father which is in heaven," Christ be-
gan to speak about His sufferings, and Peter dared to
say: "Be it far from Thee, Lord; this shall not be
unto Thee." Then Christ had to say:
"Get thee behind me, Satan; for thou savorest
not the things that be of God, but those that be of
men."
There was Peter in his self-will, trusting his own
wisdom, and actually forbidding Christ to go and die.
Whence did that come? Peter trusted in himself
and his own thoughts about divine things. We see
later on, more than once, that among the disciples
there was a questioning who should be the greatest,
and Peter was one of them, and he thought he had a
right to the very first place. He sought his own
honor even above the others. It was the life of self
strong in Peter. He had left his boats and his nets,
but not his old self.
When Christ had spoken to him about His suffer-
ings, and said: " Get thee behind me, Satan," He fol-
lowed it up by saying: " If any man will come after
me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and
follow me." No man can follow Him unless he do
that. Self must be utterly denied. What does that
mean? When Peter denied Christ, we read that he
three times said: " I do not know the man "; in other
52 PETER'S REPENTANCE
words: "I have nothing to do with Him; He and I
are no friends; I deny having any connection with
Him." Christ told Peter that he must deny self.
Self must be ignored, and its every claim rejected.
That is
THE EOOT OF TRUE DISCIPLESHIP;
but Peter did not understand it, and could not obey
it. And what happened? When the last night came,
Christ said to him:
" Before the cock crow twice thou shalt deny me
thrice."
But with what self-confidence Peter said: " Though
all should forsake Thee, yet will not I. I am ready
to go with Thee, to prison and to death."
Peter meant it honestly, and Peter really intended
to do it; but Peter did not know himself. He did
not believe he was so bad as Jesus said he was.
We perhaps think of individual sins that come be-
tween us and God, but what are we to do with that self-
life which is all unclean, our very nature ? What are we
to do with that flesh that is entirely under the power
of sin? Deliverance from that is what we need.
Peter knew it not, and therefore it was that in his
self-confidence he went forth, and denied his Lord.
Notice how Christ uses that word deny twice. He
said to Peter the first time. Deny self; He said to
Peter the second time. Thou wilt deny me. It is
either of the two. There is no choice for us; we
must either deny self or deny Christ. There are two
great powers fighting each other — the self-nature in
the power of sin, and Christ in the power of God.
Either of these must rule within us.
PETER'S REPENTANCE 53
It was self that made the devil. He was an angel
of God, but he wanted to exalt self. He became a
devil in hell. Self was the cause of the fall of man.
Eve ^wanted something for herself, and so our first
parents fell into all the wretchedness of sin. We
their children have inherited an awful nature of sin.
3. Look LOW at
PETER'S REPENTANCE.
Peter denied his Lord thrice, and then the Lord
looked upon him; and that look of Jesus broke the
heart of Peter, and all at once there opened up before
him the terrible sin that he had committed, the terri-
ble failure that had come, and the dei)th into which
he had fallen, and "Peter went out and wept bitterly."
Oh! who can tell what that repentance must have
been? During the following hours of that night, and
the next day, when he saw Christ crucified and buried,
and the next day, the Sabbath — oh, in what hopeless
despair and shame he must have spent that day !
"My Lord is gone, my hope is gone, and I denied
my Lord. After that life of love, after that blessed
fellowship of three years, I denied my Lord. God
have mercy upon me! "
I do not think we can realize into what a depth of
humiliation Peter sank then. But that was the
turning-point and the change; and on the first day
of the week Christ was seen of Peter, and in the
evening He met him with the others. Later on at
the Lake of Galilee He asked him: " Lovest thou
me? " until Peter was made sad by the thought that
the Lord reminded him of having denied Him thrice;
and said in sorrow, but in uprightness:
54 PETER'S REPENTANCE
"Lord, Thou knowest all things; Thou knowest
that I love Thee."
4. And then Peter was prepared for
THE DELIVERANCE FROM SELF; ♦
and that is my last thought. You know Christ took
him with others to the footstool of the throne,
and bade them wait there; and then on the day of
Pentecost the Holy Spirit came, and Peter was a
changed man. I do not want you only to think of
the change in Peter, in that boldness, and that pow-
er, and that insight into the Scriptures, and that
blessing with which he preached that day. Thank
God for that. But there was something for
Peter deeper and better. Peter's whole nature
was changed. The work that Christ began in
Peter when He looked upon him, was perfected
when he was filled with the Holy Ghost.
If you want to see that, read the First Epistle of
Peter. You know wherein Peter's failings lay.
When he said to Christ, in effect: " Thou never canst
suffer; it cannot be " — it showed he had not a con-
ception of what it was to pass through death into
life. Christ said: "Deny thyself,'''' and in spite of
that he denied his Lord. When Christ warned him:
" Thou shalt deny me," and he insisted that he never
would, Peter showed how little he understood what
there was in himself. But when I read his epistle
and hear him say: " If ye be reproached for the name
of Christ, happy are ye, for the Spirit of God and of
glory resteth upon you," then I say that is not the
old Peter, but that is the very Spirit of Christ
breathing and speaking within him.
PETERS REPENTANCE 55
I read again how he says: " Hereunto ye are called,
to suffer, even as Christ suffered." I understand what
a change had come over Peter. Instead of denying
Christ, he found joy and pleasure in having self
denied and crucified and given up to the death.
And therefore it is in the Acts we read that, when he
was called before the Council, he could boldly say:
" We must obey God rather than men," and that he
could return with the other disciples and rejoice that
they were counted worthy to suffer for Christ's
name.
You remember his self-exaltation; but now he
has found out that " the ornament of a meek and quiet
spirit is in the sight of God of great price." Again
he tells us to be "subject one to another, and be
clothed with humility."
Dear friend, I beseech you, look at Peter utterly
changed — the self pleasing, the self trusting, the
self-seeking Peter, full of sin, continually get-
ting into trouble, foolish and im]3etuous, but now
filled with the Spirit and the life of Jesus. Christ
had done it for him by the Holy Ghost.
And now, what is my object in having thus very
briefly pointed to the story of Peter? That story
must be the history of every believer who is really
to be made a blessing by God. That story is a
prophecy of what every one can receive from God in
heaven.
Now let us just glance hurriedly at what these
lessons teach us.
The^?-s/ lesson is this: You may be a very ear-
nest, godly, devoted believer, in whom the power of
the flesh is yet very strong.
5G PETER'S REPENTANCE
That is a very solemn truth. Peter, before he de-
nied Christ, had cast out devils and had healed the
sick; and yet the flesh had power, and the flesh had
room in him. Oh, beloved, we want to realize that
it is just on account of there being so much of that
self-life in us that the power of God cannot work in
us as mightily as God is willing that it should work.
Do you realize that the great God is longing to
double His blessing, to give tenfold blessing through
us? But there is something hindering Him, and
that something is a proof of nothing but the self- life.
We talk about the pride of Peter, and the impetuos-
ity of Peter, and the self-confidence of Peter. It
all rooted in that one word, self. Christ had said,
" Deny self," and Peter had never understood, and
never obeyed; and every failing came out of that.
What a solemn thought, and wdiat an urgent plea
for us to cry: O God, do discover this to us, that none
of us may be living the self4ife! It has happened to
many a one who had been a Christian for years, who
had perhaps occupied a x^rominent position, that God
found him out, and taught him to find himself out,
and he became utterly ashamed, and fell down broken
before God. Oh, the bitter shame and sorrow and
pain and agony that came to him, until at last he
found that there was deliverance! Peter went out
and wept bitterly, and there may be many a godly
one in whom the power of the flesh rules still.
And then my second lesson is: — It is the work of
our blessed Lord Jesus to discover the power of self.
How was it that Peter, the carnal Peter, self-willed
Peter, Peter with the strong selfdove, ever became a
man of Pentecost and the writer of his Epistle? It
PETER'S REPENTANCE 57
was because Christ had him in charge, and Christ
watched over him, and Christ taught and blessed him.
The warnings that Christ had given him were part of
the training; and last of all there came that look of
love. In His suffering Christ did not forget him,
but turned round and looked upon him, and " Peter
went out and wept bitterly." And the Christ who
led Peter to Pentecost is waiting to-day to take
charge of every heart that is willing to surrender it-
self to Him.
Are there not some saying: "Ah! that is the mis-
chief with me; it is always the self4ife, and self=com-
fort, and self^consciousness, and self-pleasing, and
self-will; how am I to get rid of it?"
My answer is: It is Christ Jesus who can rid you
of it; none else but Christ Jesus can give deliverance
from the power of self. And what does He ask you
to do? He asks that you should humble yourself be-
fore Him.
IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE
WITH GOD.
"And He said, The things which are impossible
with men are possible with God." — Liike xviii. 27.
Christ had said to the rich young ruler, " Sell all that
thou hast . . . and come, follow me." The young
man went away sorrowful. Christ then turned to the
disciples, and said: " How hardly shall they that
have riches enter into the kingdom of God!" The
disciples, we read, were greatly astonished, and an-
swered: "If it is so difficult to enter the kingdom,
who, then, can be saved?" And Christ gave this
blessed answer:
" The things which are Impossible with men are
possible with God."
The text contains two thoughts — that m religion,
in the question of salvation and of following Christ
by a holy life, it is impossible for man to do it. And
then alongside that is the thought — What is impossi-
ble icith man is possible loith God.
The two thoughts mark the two great lessons that
man has to learn in the religious life. It often takes
a long time to learn the first lesson, that in religion
man can do nothing, that salvation is impossible to
man. And often a man learns that, and yet he does
not learn the second lesson — what has been impossi-
ble to him is possible with God. Blessed is the man
who learns l:)oth lessons! The learning of them marks
stages in the Christian's life.
58
IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH OOD 59
The one stage is when a man is trying to do his ut-
most and fails, when a man tries to do still better and
fails again, when a man tries still more and always
fails. And yet very often he does not even then
learn the lesson: With man it is impossible to serve
God and Christ. Peter spent three years in Christ's
school, and he never learned that word, It is impossi-
ble, until he had denied his Lord and went out and
wept bitterly. Then he learned it.
Just look for a moment at a man who is learning
this lesson. At first he fights against it; then he sub-
mits to it, but reluctantly and in despair; at last he
accepts it willingly and rejoices in it. At the begin-
ning of the Christian life the young convert has no
conception of this truth. He has been converted, he
has the joy of the Lord in his heart, he begins to run
the race and fight the battle; he is sure he can con-
quer, for he is earnest and honest, and God will help
him. Yet, somehow, very soon he fails where he did
not expect it, and sin gets the better of him. He is
disappointed; but he thinks: "I was not watchful
enough, I did not make my resolutions strong enough."
And again he vows, and again he prays, and yet he
fails. He thought: "Am I not a regenerate man?
Have I not the life of Grod within me?" And he
thinks again: "Yes, and I have Christ to help me, I
can live the holy life."
At a later period he comes to another state of mind.
He begins to see such a life is impossible, but he
does not accept it. There are multitudes of Chris-
tians who come to this point: "I cannot"; and then
think God never expected them to do what they can-
60 IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD
not do. If you tell them that God does expect it, ii
appears to them a mystery. A good many Christians
are living a low life, a life of failure and of sin, in-
stead of rest and victory, because they began to see:
" I cannot, it is impossible." And yet they do not
understand it fully, and so, under the impression, I
cannot, they give way to despair. They will do their
best, but they never expect to get on very far.
But God leads His children on to a third stage,
when a man comes to take that w^ord, It is impossible,
in its full truth, and yet at the same time says: " I
must do it, and I will do it — it is impossible for man,
and yet I must do it"; w^ien the renewed will begins
to exercise its whole power, and in intense longing
and prayer begins to cry to God: '' Lord, what is the
meaning of this? — how am I to be freed from the
power of sin?"
It is the state of the regenerate man in Rom. vii.
There you will find the Christian man trying his very
utmost to live a holy life. God's law has been re-
vealed to him as reaching down into the very depth
of the desires of the heart, and the man can dare to
say:
" I delight in the law of God after the inward man.
To will what is good is present with me. My heart
loves the law of God, and my will has chosen that
law."
Can a man like that fail, with his heart full of de-
light in God's law and with his will determined to do
what is right? Yes. That is v/hat Rom. vii. teaches
us. There is something more needed. Not only
must I delight in the law of God after the inward
IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD 61
man, and will what God wills, but I need a divine
omnipotence to work it in me. And that is what the
Apostle Paul teaches in Phil, ii.:
" It is God which worketh in you, both to will and
to do."
Note the contrast. In Rom. vii, the regenerate man
says: "To will is present with me, but to do — I find
I cannot do. I will, but I cannot perform." But in
Phil, ii, you have a man who has been led on farther,
a man who understands that when God has worked
the renewed will, God will give the power to accom-
plish what that will desires. Let us receive this as
THE FIRST GEEAT LESSON IN THE SPIKITUAL LIFE:
" It is impossible for me, my God; let there be an
end of the flesh and all its powers, an end of self,
and let it be my glory to be helpless."
Praise God for the divine teaching that makes us
helpless!
When you thought of absolute sur]»ender to God,
were you not brought to an end of yourself, and to
feel that you could see how you actually could live
as a man absolutely surrendered to God every mo-
ment of the day — at your table, in your house, in your
business, in the midst of trials and temptations? I
pray you learn the lesson now. If you felt you could
not do it, you are on the right road, if you let your-
selves be led. Accept that position, and maintain it
before God: " My heart's desire and delight. Oh God,
is absolute surrender, but I cannot perform it. It
is impossible for me to live that life. It is beyond
62 IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD
me." Fall down and learn that when you are ut-
terly helpless, God will come to work in you not only
to will, but also to do.
II.
Now comes the second lesson. " The things which
are impossible with men are possible with God.'''*
I said a little while ago that there is many a man
w^ho has learned the lesson. It is impossible xvith men,
and then he gives up in helpless despair, and lives a
wretched Christian life, without joy, or strength, or
victory. And why? Because he does not humble
himself to learn that other lesson: With God all
things are possible.
Your religious life is every day to be a proof that
God works impossibilities; your religious life is to be
a series of impossibilities made possible and actual
by God's almighty power. That is what the Chris-
tian needs. He has an almighty God that he wor-
ships, and he must learn to understand that he does
not need a little of God's power, but he needs — with
reverence be it said — the whole of God's omnipo-
tence to keep him right, and to live like a Christian.
The whole of Christianity is a work of God's
omnipotence. Look at the birth of Christ Jesus.
That was a miracle of divine power, and it v/as said
to Mary: "With God nothing shall be impossible."
It was the omnipotence of God. Look at Christ's
resurrection. We are taught that it was according
to the exceeding greatness of His mighty power that
God raised Christ from the dead.
Every tree must grow on the root from which
it springs. An oak4ree three hundred years old
IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD 63
grows all the time on the one root from which it had
its beginning. Christianity had its beginning in
the omnipotence of God, and in every soul it must
have its continuance in that omnipotence. All the
possibilities of the higher Christian life have their
origin in a new apprehension of Christ's power to work
all God's will in us.
I want to call upon you now to come and wor-
ship an almighty God. Have you learned to do it?
Have you learned to deal so closely with an al-
mighty God that you know omnipotence is working
in you? In outward appearance there is often so
little sign of it. The apostle Paul said: '' I was with
you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling,
and . . . my preaching was ... in demon-
stration of the Spirit and of power." From the hu-
man side there was feebleness, from the divine side
there was divine omnipotence. And that is true of
every godly life; and if we would only learn that lesson
better, and give a whole-hearted, undivided sur-
render to it, we should learn what blessedness there
is in dwelling every hour and every moment with an
almighty God. Have you ever studied in the Bible
the attribute of God's omnipotence? You know
that it was God's omnipotence that created the world,
and created light out of darkness, and created man.
But have you studied God's omnipotence in the
works of redemption?
Look at Abraham. When God called him to be
the father of that people out of which Christ was
to be born, God said to him: " I am God Almighty,
walk before me and be thou perfect." And God
trained Abraham to trust Him as the Omnipotent
64 IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD
One; and whether it was his going out to a land that
he knew not, or his faith as a pilgrim amidst the
thousands of Canaanites, — his faith that said: This
is my land, — or whether it was his faith in waiting
twenty-five years for a son in his old age, against all
hope, or whether it was the raisings up of Isaac from the
dead on Mount Moriah when he was going to sacrifice
him, Abraham believed God. He was strong in faith,
giving glory to God, because he accounted Him who
had promised able to perform.
THE CAUSE OF THE WEAKNESS OF YOUR CHRISTIAN
LIFE
is that you want to work it out partly, and to let God
help you. And that cannot be. You must come to
be utterly helpless, to let God work, and God will
work gloriously.
It is this that we need if we are indeed to be work-
ers for God. I could go through Scripture, and
prove to you how Moses, when he led Israel out of
Egypt; how Joshua, when he brought them into the
land of Canaan; how all God's servants in the Old
Testament counted upon the omnipotence of God do-
ing impossibilities. And this God lives to-day, and
this God is the God of every child of His. And yet
we are some of us wanting God to give us a little
help while we do our best, instead of coming to un-
derstand what God wants, and to say: "I can do
nothing. God must and will do all." Have you
said: "In worship, in work, in sanctification, in
obedience to God, I can do nothing of myself, and so
my place is to worship the omnipotent God, and to
believe that He will work in me every moment"?
IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD 65
Oh, may God teacli us this! Oh that God would by
His grace show you vihat a God you have, and to
what a God you have intrusted yourself, — an omnipo-
tent God, willing with His whole omnipotence to
place Himself at the disposal of every child of
His. Shall we not take the lesson of the Lord Jesus
and say :" Amen ; the things which are impossible
with men are possible with God"?
Remember what w^e have said about Peter, his self=
confidence, self=power, self-will, and how he came to
deny his Lord. You feel: "Ah! there is the self-
life, there is the flesh4ife that rules in me! " And
now, have you believed that there is deliverance from
that? Have you believed that Almighty God is able
so to reveal Christ in your heart, so to let the Holy
Spirit rule in you, that the self4ife shall not have
power or dominion over you? Have you coupled the
two together, and with tears of penitence and with
deep humiliation and feebleness, cried out: " O God,
it is impossible to me; man cannot do it, but, glory
to Thy name, it is possible with God"? Have you
claimed deliverance? Do it now. Put yourself
afresh in absolute surrender into the hands of a God
of infinite love; and as infinite as His love is His
power to do it.
But again. We came to the question of absolute
surrender, and felt that that is the want in the Church
of Christ, and that is why the Holy Ghost cannot fill
us, and why we cannot live as people entirely separa-
ted unto the Holy Ghost; that is why the flesh and
the self4ife cannot be conquered. We have never
understood what it is to be absolutely surrendered to
God as Jesus was. I know that many a one earnest-
66 IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD
ly and honestly says: " Amen, I accept the message
of absolute surrender to God"; and yet thinks: " Will
that ever be mine? Can I count upon God to make
me one of whom it shall be said in heaven and on
earth and in hell, He lives in absolute surrender to
God?" Brother, sister, " the things which are im-
possible with men are possible with God." Do be-
lieve that when He takes charge of you in Christ, it
is possible for God to make you a man of absolute
surrender. And God is able to maintain that. He
is able to let you rise from bed every morning of the
week with that blessed thought directly or indirectly :
" I am in God's charge. My God is working out my
life for me."
Some are weary of thinking about sanctification.
You pray, you have longed and cried for it, and yet
it appeared so far off! The holiness and humility of
Jesus — you are so conscious of how distant it is.
Beloved friends, the one doctrine of sanctification that
is Scriptural and real and effectual is: " The things
which are impossible with men are possible with
God." God can sanctify men, and by His almighty
and sanctifying power every moment God can keep
them. Oh that we might get a step nearer to our
God now! Oh that the light of God might shine,
and that we might know our God better!
I could go on to speak about the life of Christ in
us — living like Christ, taking Christ as our Savior
from sin, and as our life and strength. It is God in
heaven who can reveal that in you. What does that
prayer of the Apostle Paul say : " That He would
grant you according to riches of His glory " — it is
sure to be something very wonderful if it is accord-
IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD 67
ing to the riches of His glory — " to be strengthened
with might by His Spirit in the inner man"? Do
you not see that it is an omnipotent God working by
His omnipotence in the heart of His believing chil-
dren, so that Christ can become an indwelling Savior?
You have tried to grasp it and to seize it, and you
have tried to believe it, and it would not come. It
was because you had not been brought to believe
that "the things which are impossible with men are
possible with God."
And so, I trust that the word spoken about love
may have brought many to see that we must have an
inflowing of love in quite a new way; our heart must
be filled with life from above, from the Fountain of
everlasting love, if it is going to overflow all the day;
then it will be just as natural for us to love our fel-
low men as it is natural for the lamb to be gentle
and the wolf to be cruel. Until I am brought to such
a state that the more a man hates and speaks evil of
me, the more unlikable and unlovable a man is, I
shall love him all the more-; until I am brought
to such a state that the more the obstacles and ha-
tred and ingratitude, the more can the power of love
triumph in me — until I am brought to see that, I am
not saying: " It is impossible with men." But if you
have been led to say: " This message has spoken to
me about a love utterly beyond my power; it is ab-
solutely impossible " — then we can come to God and
say: "It is possible with Thee."
Some are crying to God for a great revival. I can
say that that is the prayer of my heart unceasingly.
Oh, if God would only revive His believing people !
I cannot think, in the first place, of the unconverted
68 IMPOSSIBLE WITH MAN, POSSIBLE WITH GOD
formalists of the Church, or of the infidels and skep-
tics, or of all the wretched and perishing around me;
my heart prays in the first place: "My God, revive
Thy Church and people." It is not for nothing that
there are in thousands of hearts yearnings after holi-
ness and consecration: it is a forerunner of God's
power. God works to ivill and then He works to do.
These yearnings are a witness and a proof that God
has worked to ivill. Oh, let us in faith believe that
the omnipotent God will work to do among His peo-
ple more than we can ask. " Unto Him," Paul said,
" who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all
that we ask or think, . . . unto Him be glory."
Let our hearts say that. Glory to God, the Omni-
potent One, who can do above what we dare to ask or
think!
"The things which are impossible with men are
possible with God." All round about you there is
a world of sin and sorrow, and the devil is there.
But remember, Christ is on the throne, Christ is
stronger, Christ has conquered, and Christ will con-
quer. But wait on God. My text casts us down:
"The things which are impossible loith men^^; but it
ultimately lifts us up high — ^' QlTq possible ivitli God,''''
Get linked to God. Adore and trust Him as the
Omnipotent one, not only for your own life, but for
all the souls that are intrusted to you. Never pray
without adoring His omnipotence: and say: ''Mighty
God, I claim Thine almightiness.''^ And the answer
to the prayer will come, and like Abraham you will
become strong in faith, giving glory to God, because
you account Him who hath promised able to perform.
"O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AMI"
*' O wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver me
from the body of this death? I thank God through
Jesus Christ our Lord." — Rom. 7 : 24, 25.
You know the wonderful place that this text has
in the wonderful epistle to the Komans. It stands
here at the end of tlie seventh chapter as the
gateway into the eighth. In the first sixteen verses
of the eighth chapter the name of the Holy Spirit is
found sixteen times; you have there the description
and promise of the life that a child of God can live
in the power of the Holy Ghost. This begins in the
second verse: "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ
Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and
death." From that Paul goes on to speak of the
great privileges of the child of God, who is to be led
by the Spirit of God. The gateway into all this is
in the twenty=fourth verse of the seventh chapter:
''O wTetched man that I am!"
There you have the words of a man who has come
to the end of himself. He has in the previous verses
described how he had struggled and wrestled in his
own power to obey the holy law of God, and had
failed. But in answer to his own question he now
finds the true answer and cries out: *' I thank God
through Jesus Christ our Lord." From that he goes
on to speak of wdiat that deliverance is that he has
found.
69
70 "O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM''
I want from these words to describe the path by
which a man can be led out of the spirit of bondage
into the spirit of liberty. You know how distinctly
it is said: "Ye have not received the spirit of bond-
age again to fear," We are continually warned that
this is the great danger of the Christian life, to go
again into bondage; and I want to describe the path
by which a man can get out of bondage into the glo-
rious liberty of the children of God. Rather, I want
to describe the man himself.
First, these words are the language of a regenerate
man; second, of an impotent man; thirds of a
wretched man; and fourth, of a man on the borders
of comjjlete liberty.
In the first place, then, we have here
THE WORDS OF A REGENERATE MAN.
You know how much evidence there is of that
from the fourteenth verse of the chapter on to the
twenty^hird. " It is no more I that do it, but sin
that dwelleth in me": that is the language of a re-
generate man, a man who knows that his heart and
nature have been renewed, and that sin is now a
power in him that is not himself. " I delight in the
law of the Lord after the inward man": that again is
the language of a regenerate man. He dares to say
when he does evil: "It is no more I that do it, but
sin that dwelleth in me." It is of great importance
to understand this.
In the first two great sections of the epistle, Paul
deals with justification and sanctification. In deal-
ing with justification, he lays the fou'idation of the
doctrine in the teaching about sin, not in the singu-
"O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM'' 71
lar, *'sm," but in the plural, "sins" — the actual trans-
gressions. In the second part of the fifth ciiapter ho
begins to deal with sin, not as actual transgression,
but as a power. Just imagine what a loss it would
have been to us if we had not this second half of the
seventh chapter of the Epistle to the Komans, if Paul
had omitted in his teaching this vital question of the
sinfulness of the believer. We should have missed
the question w^e all want answered as to sin in the
believer. What is the answer? The regenerate man
is one in whom the will has been renewed, and who
can say: "I delight in the law of God after the in-
ward man."
But secondly: The 7'egenercde man is also
AN IMPOTENT MAN,
Here is the great mistake made by many Christian
people. They think that when there is a renewed
will it is enough; but that is not the case. This re-
generate man tells us: ^' I ivill to do what is good,
but the power to perform I find not." How often
people tell us that if you set yourself determinedly
you can perform what you will. But this man was
as determined as any man can be, and yet he made
the confession: "To will is i^resent with me; but
how to perform that which is good, I find not."
But, you ask, how is it God makes a regenerate
man utter such a confession, with a right will, with a
heart that longs to do good, and longs to do its very
utmost to love God?
Let us look at this question. What has God given
us our will for? Had the angels who fell, in their
own will, the strength to stand? Verily, no. The
72 " O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM''
will of the creature is nothing but an empty vessel in
which the power of God is to be made manifest.
The creature must seek in God all that it is to be.
You have it in the second chapter of the Epistle to
the Philippians, and you have it here also, that God's
work is to work in us both to will and to do of His
good pleasure. Here is a man who appears to say:
"God has not worked to do in me." But we are
taught that God works both to will and to do. How
is the apparent contradiction to be reconciled?
You will find that in this passage (Eom. 7:6-25)
the name of the Holy Spirit does not occur once, nor
does the name of Christ occur. The man is wrest-
ling and struggling to fulfil God's law. In the
chapter, instead of the Holy Spirit and of Christ, the
law is mentioned nearly twenty times. It shows a
believer doing his very best to obey the law of God
with his regenei'ate will. Not only this; but you will
find the little words, " I," " me," " my," occur more
than forty times. It is the regenerate "I" in its
impotence seeking to obey the law w^ithout being
filled with the Spirit. This is the experience of al-
most every saint. After conversion a man begins to
do his best, and he fails; but if we are brought into
the full light we need fail no longer. Nor need we
fail at all if we have received the Spirit in His ful-
ness at conversion.
God allows that failure that the regenerate man
should be taught his own utter impotence, It is in
the course of this struggle that there comes to us this
sense of our utter sinfulness. It is God's way of
dealing with us. He allows that man to strive to
fulfil the law that, as he strives and wrestles, he may
« 0 WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM" 73
be brought to this: " I am a regenerate child of God,
but I am utterly helpless to obey His law." See
what strong words are used all through the chapter
to describe this condition: " I am carnal, sold under
sin"; "I see another law in my members bringing
me into captivity"; and last of all, " O wretched man
that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of
this death?" This believer who bows here in deep
contrition is utterly unable to obey the law of God.
But thirdly: Not only is tJie mem lolio makes this
confession a regenerate and an impotent man, hut
he is also
A WRETCHED MAN.
He is utterly unhappy and miserable; and what
is it that makes him so utterly miserable? It is be-
cause God has given him a nature that loves Him-
self. He is deeply wretched because he feels he is not
obeying his God. He says, with brokenness of heart:
'•It is not I that do it, but I am under the awful power
of sin, which is holding me down. It is I, and
yet not I: alas! alas! it is myself; so closely am I
bound up with it, and so closely is it intertwined
with my very nature." Blessed be God when a man
learns to say: "O wretched man that I am!" from
the depth of his heart. He is on the way to the
eighth chapter of Romans.
There are many who make this confession a pil-
low for sin. They say that Paul had to confess his
weakness and helplessness in this way, what are they
that they should try to do better? So the call to ho-
liness is quietly set aside. Would God that every
one of us had learned to say these words in the very
74 "0 WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM''
spirit in which they are written here! When we
hear sin spoken of as the abominable thing that God
hates, do not many of us wince before the word?
Would that all Christians who go on sinning and
sinning would take this verse to heart. If ever you
utter a sharp word say: *' O wretched man that I
am!" And every time you lose your temper, kneel
down and understand . that it never was meant by
God that this w^as to be the state in which His child
should remain. Would God that we w^ould take
this word into our daily life, and say it every time we
are touched about our own honor, and every time we
say sharp things, and every time W'e sin against the
Lord God, and against the Lord Jesus Christ in His
humility, and in His obedience, and in His self-sac-
rifice! Would to God you could forget everything
else, and cry out: "O wretched man that I am! who
shall deliver me from the body of this death? "
Why should you say this wdienever you commit
sin? Because it is when a man is brought to this
confession that deliverance is at hand.
And remember it w^as not only the sense of being
impotent and taken captive that made him wretched,
but it was above all the sense of sinning against his
God. The law was doing its work, making sin ex-
ceedliKj sinful in his sight. The thought .of contin-
ually grieving God became utterly unbearable — it was
this brought forth the piercing cry: "O wretched
man! " As long as we talk and reason about our im-
potence and our failure, and only try to find out
what Romans vii. means, it will profit us but little;
but when once everij sin gives new intensity to the
sense of wretchedness, and we feel our whole state as
" O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM" 75
one of not only helplessness, but actual exceeding
einfulness, we shall be pressed not only to ask:
" Who shall deliver us?" but to cry: '' I thank God
through Jesus Christ my Lord."
Fourthly: When a man comes here he is
ON THE VERY BRINK OF DELIVERANCE.
The man has tried to obey the beautiful law of
God. He has loved it, he has wept over his sin,
he has tried to conquer, he has tried to overcome
fault after fault, but every time he has ended in fail-
ure.
What did he mean by " the body of this death " ?
Did he mean, my body when I die? Verily no. In
the eighth chapter you have the answer to this ques-
tion in the words: " If ye through the Spirit do mor-
tify the deeds of the body, ye shall live." That is
the body of death from which he is seeking deliver-
ance.
And now he is on the brink of deliverance! In the
twenty third verse of the seventh chapter we have
the w'ords: "I see another law in my members, war-
ring against the law of my mind, and bringing me
into captivity to the law of sin which is in my mem-
bers." Itis a captive that cries: ''O wretched man
that I am ! who shall deliver me from the body of this
death?" He is a man w'ho feels himself bound.
But look to the contrast in the second verse of the
eighth chapter: "The law of the Spirit of life in
Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin
and death." That is the deliverance through Jesus
Christ our Lord; the liberty to the cai^tive which
the Spirit brings. Can you keep captive any
76 "O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM"
longer a man made free by the " law of the Spirit of
life in Christ Jesus" ?
But you say, the regenerate man, had not he the
Spirit of Jesus when he spoke in the sixth chapter?
Yes, hut he did not knoio ivhat the Holy Spirit could
do for him.
God does not work by His Spirit as He works by
a blind force in nature. He leads His people on as
reasonable, intelligent beings, and therefore when
He wants to give us that Holy Spirit whom He has
promised. He brings us first to the end of self, to the
conviction that though we have been striving to obey
the law, we have failed. When we have come to the
end of that, then He shows us that in the Holy
Spirit we have the power of obedience, the power
of victory, and the power of real holiness.
God works to will, and He is ready to work to do,
but, alas! many Christians misunderstand this. They
think because they have the will it is enough, and
that now they are able to do. This is not so. The
new will is a permanent gift, an attribute of the new
nature. The power to do is not a permanent gift,
but must be each moment received from the Holy
Spirit. It is the man who is conscious of his oion
impotence as a believer who will learn that by the
Holy Spirit he can live a holy life. This man is on
the brink of that great deliverance; the way has
been prepared for the glorious eighth chapter. I now
ask tliis solemn question: Where are you living? Is
it with you, '' O wretched man that I am! who shall
deliver me?" with now and then a little experience
of the power of the Holy Spirit? or is it, " I thank
"O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM'' 77
Grod through Jesus Christ! The law of the Spirit
hath set me free from the law of sin and of death"?
What the Holy Spirit does is to give the victory.
"If ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of
the flesh, ye shall live." It is the Holy Ghost who
does this — the third Person of the Godhead. He it
is who, when the heart is opened wide to receive Him,
comes in and reigns there, and mortifies the deeds of
the body, day by day, hour by hour, and moment by
moment.
I want to bring this to a point. Remember, dear
friend, what we need is to come to decision and ac-
tion. There are in Scripture two very dilBPerent sorts
of Christians. The Bible speaks in Romans, CoiHn-
thians and Galatians about yielding to the flesh; and
that is the life of tens of thousands of believers. All
their want of joy in the Holy Ghost, and their want
of the liberty He gives, is just owing to the flesh.
The Spirit is within them, but the flesh rules the
life. To be led by the Spirit of God is what they
need. Would God that I could make every child of
His realize what it means that the Everlasting God
has given His dear Son, Christ Jesus, to watch over
you every day, and that what you have to do is to trust;
and that the work of the Holy Spirit is to enable
you every moment to remember Jesus, and to trust
Him! The Spirit has come to keep the link with
Him unbroken every moment. Praise God for the
Holy Ghost! We are so accustomed to think of the
Holy Spirit as a luxury, something for special times,
or for special ministers and men. But the Holy
Spirit is necessary for every believer, every moment
78 " O WRETCHED MAN THAT 1 AM''
of the day. Praise God you have Him, and that He
gives you the full experience of the deliverance in
Christ, as He makes you free from the power of sin.
Who longs to have the power and the liberty of the
Holy Spirit? Oh, brother, bow before God in one
final cry of despair:
"O God, must I go on sinning this way forever?
Who shall deliver me, O wretched man that I am!
from the body of this death?"
Are you ready to sink before God, in that cry, and
seek the power of Jesus to dwell and work in you?
Are you ready to say: *' I thank God through Jesus
Christ"?
What good does it do that we go to church or at-^
tend conventions, that we study our Bibles and pray,
unless our lives are filled with the Holy Spirit?
That is what God wants; and nothing else will ena-
ble us to live a life of power and peace. You know
that when a minister or parent is using the cate-
chism, when a question is asked an answer is ex-
pected. Alas! how many Christians are content with
the question put here: "O wretched man that I ami
who shall deliver me iTom the body of this death ? "
but never give the answer. Instead of answering,
they are silent. Instead of saying: " I thank God
through Jesus Christ our Lord," they are for ever re-
peating the question without the answer. If you
want the path to the full deliverance of Christ, and
the liberty of the Spirit, the glorious liberty of the
children of God, take it through the seventh chapter
of Romans; and then say: "I thank God through
Jesus Christ our Lord." Be not content to remain
"O WRETCHED MAN THAT I AM'' 79
ever groaning, but say: "I, a wretched man, thank
God, through Jesus Christ. Even though I do not
see it all, I am going to praise God."
There is deliverance, there is the liberty of the
Holy Spirit. The kingdom of God is "joy in the
Holy Ghost."
"HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT."
The words from which I wish to address you, you
will find in the Epistle to the Galatians, the third
chapter, at the third verse; let us read the second
verse also: " This only would I learn of you, Eeceived
ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hear-
ing of faith? Are ye so foolish?" And then comes
my text — " Having begun in the Spirit, are ye now
made perfect by the flesh?"
When we sj)eak of the quickening or the deepen-
ing or the strengthening of the spiritual life, we are
thinking of something that is feeble and wrong and
sinful; and it a great thing to take our place before
God with the confession:
" Oh God, our spiritual life is not what it should
be!"
May God work that in your heart, reader.
As we look round about on the church we see so
many indications of feebleness and of failure, and of
sin, and of shortcoming, that we are compelled to ask:
Why is it? Is there any necessity for the church of
Christ to be living in such a low state? Or is it ac-
tually possible that God's people should be living
always in the joy and strength of their God?
Every believing heart must answer: It is possible.
Then comes the great question: Why is it, how is
it to be accounted for, that God's church as a whole
is so feeble, and that the great majority of Christians
80
*' HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT^' 81
are not living up to their privileges? There must be
a reason for it. Has God not given Christ His Al-
mighty Son to be the Keeper of every believer, to
make Christ an ever-present reality, and to impart
and communicate to us all that we have in Christ?
God has given His Son, and God has given His
Spirit. How is it that believers do not live up to
their privileges?
We find in more than one of the epistles a very
solemn answer to that question. There are epistles,
such as the first to the Thessalonians, where Paul
writes to the Christians, in effect: "I want you to
grow, to abound, to increase more and more." They
were young, and there were things lacking in their
faith, but their state was so far satisfactory, and gave
him great joy, and he writes time after time: "I
pray God that you may abound more and more; I
write to you to increase more and more." But there
are other epistles where he takes a very different
tone, especially the epistles to the Corinthians and
the Galatians, and he tells them in many different
ways what the one reason was, that they were not liv-
ing as Christians ought to live; many were under the
power of the flesh. My text is one example. He re-
minds them that by the preaching of faith they had
received the Holy Spirit. He had preached Christ
to them; they had accepted that Christ, and had re-
ceived the Holy Spirit in power. But what hap-
pened? Having begun in the Spirit, they tried to
perfect the work that the Spirit had begun, in the
flesh by their own effort. We find the same teach-
ing in the epistles to the Corinthians.
Now, we have here a solemn discovery of what the
82 ''HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT"
great want is in the Church of Christ. God has
called the Church of Christ to live in the power of
the Holy Spirit, and the church is living for the most
part in the power of human flesh, and of will and
energy and effort apart from the Spirit of God. I
doubt not that that is the case with many individual
believers; and oh, if God will use me to give you a
message from Him, my one message will be this:
" If the church will return to acknowledge that the
Holy Spirit is her strength and her help, and if the
church will return to give up everything, and wait
upon God to be filled with the Spirit, her days of
beauty and gladness will return, and we shall see the
glory of God revealed amongst us." This is my
message to every individual believer: "Nothing will
help you unless you come to understand that you must
live every day under the power of the Holy Ghost."
God wants you to be a living vessel in whom the
power of the Spirit is to be manifested every hour
and every moment of your life, and God will enable
you to be that.
Now let us try and learn that this word to the Ga-
latians teaches us — some very simple thoughts. It
shows us how ( 1 ) the heginning of the Christian life
is receiving the Holy Spirit. It shows us (2) what
great danger there is of forgetting that ive are to live
hy the Spirit, and not live after the flesh. It shows
us (3) what are the fruits and the proofs of our
seeking perfection in the flesh. And then it suggests
to us (4) the way of deliverance from this state.
I.
First of all, Paul says: " Having begun in the Spirit J^
''HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT''
Remember, the Apostle not only preached justifica-
tion by faith, but he preached something more. He
preached this — the Epistle is full of it — that justified
men cannot live but by the Holy Spirit, and that
therefore God gives to every justified man the Holy
Spirit to seal him. The Apostle says to them in
effect more than once:
" How did you receive the Holy Spirit? Was it
by the preaching of the law, or by the preaching of
faith?"
He could point back to that time when there had
been a mighty revival under his teaching. The
power of God had been manifested, and the Galatians
were compelled to confess:
"Yes, we have got the Holy Ghost: accepting
Christ by faith, by faith we received the Holy
Spirit."
Now, it is to be feared that there are many Chris-
tians who hardly know that when they believed they
received the Holy Ghost. A great many Christians
can say: "I received pardon and I received peace."
But if you were to ask them: "Have you received the
Holy Ghost? " they would hesitate, and many, if they
were to say: "Yes," would say it with hesitation; and
they would tell you that they hardly knew what it
was, since that time, to walk in the power of the Holy
Spirit. Let us try and take hold of this great trath:
The beginning of the true Christian life is to receive
the Holy Ghost. And the work of every Christian
minister is what was the work of St. Paul — to remind
his people that they received the Holy Ghost, and
must live according to His guidance and in His
power.
84: " HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT''
If those Galatians who received the Holy Spirit in
power were tempted to go astray by that terrible dan-
ger of perfecting in the flesh what had been begun in
the Spirit, how much more danger do those Chris-
tians run who hardly ever know that they have re-
ceived the Holy Spirit, or who, if they know it as a
matter of belief, hardly ever think of it and hardly
ever praise God for it!
11.
But now look, in the second place, at the great dan-
ger.
You all know what shunting is on a railway. A
locomotive with its train may be run in a certain
direction, and the points at some place may not be
properly opened or closed, and unobservingly it is
shunted off to the right or to the left. And if that
takes place, for instance, on a dark night, the train
goes in the w^rong direction, and the people might
never know it until they have gone some distance.
And just so God gives Christians the Holy Spirit
with this intention, that every day all their life should
be lived in the power of the Spirit. A man cannot
live one hour a godly life unless by the power of the
Holy Ghost. He may live a proper, consistent life,
as people call it, an irreproachable life, a life of virtue
and diligent service; but to live a life acceptable to
God, in the enjoyment of God's salvation and God's
love, to live and walk in the power of the new life —
he cannot do it unless he be guided by the Holy
Spirit every day and every hour.
But now listen to the danger. The Galatians received
the Holy Ghost, but what was begun by the Spirit
they tried to perfect in the flesh. How? They fell
" HA VING BEG UN IN THE SPIRI r " 85
back again under Judaising teachers who told them
they must be circumcised. They began to seek their
religion in external observances. And so Paul uses
that expression about those teachers who had them
circumcised, that " they sought to glory in their
flesh."
You sometimes hear the expression used, religious
flesh. What is meant by that? It is simply an ex-
pression made to give utterance to this thought: My
human nature and my human will and my human
effort can be very active in religion, and after being
converted, and after receiving the Holy Ghost, I may
begin in my own strength to try to serve God.
I may be very diligent and doing a great deal, and
yet all the time it is more the work of human flesh
than of God's Spirit. What a solemn thought, that
man can, without noticing it, be shunted off from the
line of the Holy Ghost on to the line of the flesh;
that he can be most diligent and make great sacrifices,
and yet it is all in the power of the human will! Ah,
the great question for us to ask of God in self-exam-
ination is that we may be shown whether our religious
life is lived more in the power of the flesh than in the
power of the Holy Spirit. A man may be a preacher,
he may work most diligently in his ministry, a man
may be a Christian worker, and others may tell of
him that he makes great sacrifices, and yet you can
feel there is a want about it. You feel that he is not
a spiritual man; there is no spirituality about his life.
How many Christians there are about whom no one
would ever think of saying: " What a spiritual man
he is! " Ah! there is the weakness of the Church of
Christ. It is all in that one wovd— flesh.
86 "HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT"
Now, the flesli may manifest itself in many ways.
It may be manifested in fleshly wisdom. My mind
may be most active about religion. I may preach or
write or think or meditate, and delight in being occu-
pied with things in God's Book and in God's King-
dom; and yet the power of the Holy Ghost may be
markedly absent. I fear that if you take the preach-
ing throughout the Church of Christ and ask why
there is, alas! so little converting power in the preach-
ing of the Word, why there is so much work and
often so little result for eternity, why the Word has
so little power to build up believers in holiness and
in consecration, — the answer will come: It is the
absence of the power of the Holy Ghost. And why is
this? There can be no other reason but that the
flesh and human energy have taken the place that the
Holy Ghost ought to have. That was true of the Gal-
atians, it was true of the Corinthians. You know
Paul said to them: "I cannot speak to you as to
spiritual men; you ought to be spiritual men, but you
are carnal," And you know how often in the course
of his epistles he had to reprove and condemn them
for strife and for divisions.
III.
A third thought: What are the proof s or indica-
tions that a church like the Galatians, or a Christian,
is serving God in the power of the flesh — is perfect-
incjin the flesh what ivas begun in the Spirit?
The answer is very easy. Religious self-effort
always ends in sinful flesh. What was the state of
those Galatians? Striving to be justified by the
works of the law. And yet they were quarreling and
''HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT" 87
in danger of devouring one another. Count up the
expressions that the Apostle uses to indicate their
want of love, and you will find more than twelve —
envy, jealousy, bitterness, strife, and all sorts of ex-
pressions. Read in the fourth and fifth chapters
what he says about that. You see how they tried to
serve God in their own strength, and they failed ut-
terly. All this religious effort resulted in failure.
The power of sin and the sinful flesh got the better
of them, and their whole condition was one of the
saddest that could be thought of.
This comes to us with unsjDeakable solemnity.
There is a complaint everywhere in the Christian
Church of the want of a high standard of integrity
and godliness, even among the professing members of
Christian churches. I remember a sermon which I
heard preached by Dr. Dykes on commercial moral-
ity, and he spoke of what was to be found in London.
And oh, if we speak not only of the commercial mo-
rality or immorality that is to be found in London, but
if we go into the homes of Christians, and if we
think of the life to which God has called His children,
and which He enables them to live by the Holy
Ghost, and if we think of how much, nevertheless,
there is of unlovingness and temper and sharpness
and bitterness, and if we think how much there is
very often of strife amongst the members of churches,
and how much there is of envy and jealousy and sen-
sitiveness and pride, then we are compelled to say:
" Where are marks of the presence of the Spirit of
the Lamb of God? " Wanting, sadly wanting!
Many people speak of these things as though they
were the natural result of our feebleness, and cannot
88 ''HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT''
well be helped. Many people speak of these things
as sins, yet have given up the hope of conquering
them. Many people siDeak of these things in the
Church around them, and do not see the least pros-
pect of ever having the things changed. There is no
prospect until there comes a radical change, until the
Church of God begins to see that every sin in the be-
liever comes from the flesh, from a fleshly life amidst
our religious activities, from a striving in self=effort
to serve God. Until we learn to make confession,
and until we begin to see v/e must somehow or other
get God's Spirit in power back to His Church, we
must fail. Where did the Church begin in Pente-
cost? There they began in the Spirit. But, alas,
how the Church of the next century went off into the
flesh! They thought to perfect the Church in the
flesh.
Do not let us think, because the blessed Reforma-
tion restored the great doctrine of justification by
faith, that the power of the Holy Spirit was then
fully restored. If it is our faith that God is going to
have mercy on His Church in these last ages, it will
be because the doctrine and the truth about the Holy
Spirit will not only be studied, but sought after with
a whole heart; and not only because that truth will
be sought after, but because ministers and congrega-
tions will be found bowing before God in deep abase-
ment with one cry: " We have grieved God's Spirit;
we have tried to be Christian churches with as little
as possible of God's Spirit; we have not sought to be
churches filled with the Holy Ghost."
All the feebleness in the Church is owing to the
refusal of the Church to obey its God.
HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT'
And why is that so? I know your answer. You
say: " We are too feeble and too helpless, and we try
to obey, and we vow to obey, but somehow we fail."
Ah, yes; you fail because you do not accept the
strength of God, God alone can work out His will
in you. You cannot work out God's will, but His
Holy Spirit can; and until the Church, until believers
grasp this, and cease trying by human effort to do
God's will, and wait upon the Holy Spirit to come
with all His omnipotent and enabling power, the
Church will never be what God wants her to be, and
what God is willing to make of her.
IV.
I come now to my last thought, the question : What
is the ivay to restoration f
Beloved friend, the answer is simple and easy. If
that train has been shunted off, there is nothing for
it but to come back to the point at which it was led
away. The Galatians had no other way in returning
but to come back to where they had gone wrong, to
come back from all religious effort in their own
strength, and from seeking anything by their ow^n
work, and to yield themselves humbly to the Holy
Spirit. There is no other way for us as individuals.
Is there any brother or sister whose heart is con-
scious: "Alas! my life knows but little of the iDower
of the Holy Ghost " ? I come to you with God's
message that you can have no conception of what
your life would be in the power of the Holy Spirit.
It is too high and too blessed and too wonderful, but
I bring you the message that just as truly as the ever-
lasting Son of God came to this world and wrought
90 ''HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT"
His wonderful works, that just as truly as on Calvary
He died and wrought out your redemption by His
precious blood, so, just as truly, can the Holy Spirit
come into your heart that with His divine power He
may sanctify you and enable you to do God's blessed
will, and fill your heart with joy and with strength.
But, alas! we have forgotten, we have grieved, we
have dishonored the Holy Spirit, and He has not
been able to do His work. But I bring you the mes-
sage: The Father in heaven loves to fill His children
with His Holy Spirit. God longs to give each one
individually, separately, the power of the Holy Spirit
for daily life. The command comes to us individual-
ly, unitedly. God wants us as His children to arise
and place our sins before Him, and to call upon Him
for mercy. Oh, are ye so foolish? having begun in
the Spirit, are ye perfecting in the flesh that which
was begun in the Spirit? Let us bow in shame, and
confess before God how our fleshly religion, our self=
effort, and self=confidence, have been the cause of
every failure.
I have often been asked by young Christians: " Why
is it that I fail so? I did so solemnly vow with my
whole heart, and did desire to serve God; why have I
failed? "
To such I always give the one answer: "My dear
friend, you are trying to do in your own strength
what Christ alone can do in you."
And when they tell me: "I am sure I knew Christ
alone could do it, I was not trusting in myself," my
answer always is:
" You were trusting in yourself or you could not
''HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT'' 91
have failed. If you had trusted Christ, He could not
fail."
Oh, this perfecting in the flesh what was begun in
the Spirit runs far deex^er through us than we know.
Let us ask God to discover to us that it is only when
we are brought to utter shame and emptiness that we
shall be prepared to receive the blessing that comes
from on high.
And so I come with these two questions. Are you
living, beloved brother^minister — I ask it of every
minister of the gospel — are you living under the
power of the Holy Ghost? Are you living as an
anointed, Spirit^filled man in your ministry and your
life before God? O brethren, our place is an awful
one. We have to show people what God will do for
us, not in our words and teaching, but in our life.
God help us to do it!
I ask it of every member of Christ's Church and of
every believer: Are you living a life under the
power of the Holy Spirit day by day, or are you at-
tempting to live without that ? Remember you cannot.
Are you consecrated, given up to the Spirit to work
in you and to live in you? Oh, come and confess
every failure of temper, every failure of tongue how-
ever small, every failure owing to the absence of the
Holy Spirit and the presence of the power of self.
Are you consecrated, are you given up to the Holy
Spirit?
If your answer be No, then I come with a second
question — Are you willing to be consecrated? Are
you willing to give up yourself to the power of the
Holy Spirit?
You know very well, I trust, that
92 ''HAVING BEGUN IN THE SPIRIT"
THE HUMAN SIDE OF CONSECRATION
will not help you. I may consecrate myself a hun-
dred times with all the intensity of my being, and
that will not help me. What will help me is this —
that God from heaven accepts and seals the conse-
cration.
And now are you willing to give yourselves up to
the Holy Spirit? You can do it now. A great deal
may still be dark and dim, and beyond what we un-
derstand, and you may feel nothing; but come. God
alone can effect the change. God alone, who gave
us the Holy Spirit, can restore the Holy Spirit in
power into our life. God alone can " strengthen us
with might by His Spirit in the inner man." And
to every w^aiting heart that will make the sacrifice,
and give up everything, and give time to cry and
pray to God, the answer will come. The blessing is
not far off. Our God delights to help us. He will
enable us to perfect, not in the flesh, but in the
Spirit, what was begun in the Spirit.
KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD.
The words from which I speak, you will find in 1
Pet. i.o. The third and fourth verses are: "Bless-
ed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who, . . . hath begotten us again unto a lively
hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the
dead; to an inheritance incorruptible ... re-
served in heaven for you " (and then the fifth verse),
" who are kept by the power of God through faith
unto salvation. The words of my text are: " Kept
by the power of God through faith."
There we have two wonderful, blessed truths about
the keeping by which a believer is kept unto salva-
tion. One truth is, Kept by the power of God; and
the other truth is. Kept through faith. We should
look at the two sides — at God's side and His almighty
power; offered to us to be our Keeper every moment
of the day; and at the human side, we having nothing
to do but in faith to let God do His keeping work.
We are begotten again to an inheritance kept in
heaven for us; and we are kept here on earth by the
power of God. We see there is a double keeping —
the inheritance kept for me in heaven, and I on earth
kept for the inheritance there.
Now, as to the first part of this keeping, there is
no doubt and no question. God keeps the inherit-
ance in heaven very wonderfully and perfectly, and
it is waiting there most safely. And the same God
93
94 KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD
keeps me for the inheritance. That is what I want
to understand.
You know it is very foolish of a father to take
great trouble to have an inheritance for his children,
and to keep it for them, if he does not keep them for
it. What would you think of a man spending his
whole time and making every sacrifice to amass mon-
ey, and as he gets his tens of thousands, you ask him
why it is that he sacrifices himself so, and his answer
is: "I want to leave my children a large inheritance,
and I am keeping it for them " — if you were then to
hear that that man takes no trouble to educate his
children, that he allows them to run upon the street
wild, and to go on in paths of sin and ignorance and
folly, what would you think of him? Would not you
say: "Poor man! he is keeping an inheritance for his
children, but he is not keeping or preparing his chil-
dren for the inheritance"! And there are so many
Christians who think: "My God is keeping the in-
heritance for me"; but they cannot believe: "My
God is keeping me for that inheritance." The same
power, the same love, the same God doing the double
work.
Now, I want to speak about a work God does upon
us — keeping us for the inheritance. I have already
said that we have two very simple truths: the one
the divine side — we are kept by the power of God;
the other, the human side — ice are kept through
faith.
I.
First, look at the divine side —
KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD 95
KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD.
Think, first of all, that this keeping is all-inclusive.
What is kept? You are kept. How much of you?
The whole being. Does God keep one part of you
and not another? No. Some people have an idea
that this is a sort of vague, general keeping, and that
God will keep them in such a way that when they die
they will get to heaven. But they do not apply that
word kept to everything in their being and nature.
And yet that is what God wants.
Here I have a watch. Suppose that this watch
had been borrowed from a friend, and he said to me:
" When you go to Europe I will let you take it
with you, but mind you keep it safely and bring it
back."
And suppose I injured the watch, and had the
hands broken, and the face defaced, and some of the
wheels and springs spoiled, and took it back in that
condition, and handed it to my friend, he would say:
" Ah, but I gave you that watch on condition that
you would keep it."
" Have I not kept it? There is the watch."
" But I did not want you to keep it in that gen-
eral way, so that you should bring me back only the
shell of the watch, or the remains. I expected you
to keep every part of it."
And so God does not want to keep us in this gen-
eral way, so that at the last, somehow or other, we
shall be saved as by fire, and just get into heaven.
But the keeping power and the love of God applies
to every particular of our being.
96 KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD
There are some people who think God will keep
them in spiritual things, but not in temporal things.
This latter, they say, lies outside of His line. Now,
God sends you to work in the world, but He did not
say: " I must now leave you to go and earn your own
money, and to get your livelihood for yourself." He
knows you are not able to keep yourself. But God
says: "My child, there is no work you are to do,
and no business in which you are engaged, and not a
cent which you are to spend, but I, your Father, will
take that up into my keeping." God not only cares
for the spiritual, but for the temporal also. The
greater part of the life of many people must be spent,
sometimes eight or nine or ten hours a day, amid the
temptations and distractions of business; but God will
care for you there. The keeping of God includes all.
There are other people who think: "Ah! in time of
trial God keeps me, but in times of prosperity I do
not need His keeping; then I forget Him and let Him
go." Others, again, think the very opposite. They
think: "In time of prosperity, when things are
smooth and quiet, 1 am able to cling to God, but
when heavy trials come, somehow or other my will
rebels, and God does not keep me then."
Now, I bring you the message that in prosperity as
in adversity, in the sunshine as in the dark, your
God is ready to keep you all the time.
Then again, there are others who think of this
keeping thus: " God will keep me from doing very
great wickedness, but there are small sins I cannot
expect God to keep me from. There is the sin of
temper. I cannot expect God to conquer that."
When you hear of some man who has been tempted
KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD 97
and gone astray or fallen into drunkenness or mur-
der, you thank God for His keeping power.
" I might have done the same as that man," you
say, " if God had not kept me." And you believe He
kept you from drunkenness and murder.
And why do you not believe that God can keep
you from outbreaks of temper? You thought that
this was of less importance; you did not remember
that the great commandment of the New Testament
is — " Love one another as I have loved you." And
when your temper and hasty judgment and sharp
words came out, you sinned against the highest law —
the law of God's love. And yet you say: " God will
not, God cannot" — no, you will not say, God cannot;
but you say, " God does not keep me from that."
You perhaps say: "He can; but there is something
in me that cannot attain to it, and which God does
not take away."
I want to ask you. Can believers live a holier life
than is generally lived? Can believers experience
the keeping power of God all the day, to keej) them
from sin? Can believers be kept in fellowship with
God? And I bring you a message from the Word of
God, in these words: Kept by the poiver of God.
There is no qualifying clause to them. The mean-
ing is, that if you will intrust yourself entirely and
absolutely to the omnipotence of God,
HE WILL DELIGHT TO KEEP YOU.
Some people think that they never can get so far
as that every word of their mouth should be to the
glory of God. But it is what God wants of them, it
is what God expects of them. God is willing to set
98 KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD
a watch at the door of their mouth, and if God will
do that, cannot He keep their tongue and their lips?
He can; and that is what God is going to do for
them that trust Him. God's keeping is all=inclusive,
and let every one who longs to live a holy life think
out all their needs, and all their weaknesses, and all
their shortcomings, and all their sins, and say delib-
erately: "Is there any sin that my God can not keep
me from?" And the heart will have to answer: "No;
God can help me from every sin."
Secondly, if you want to understand this keeping,
remember that it is not only an all4nclusive keeping,
but it is
AN ALMIGHTY KEEPING.
I want to get that truth burned into my soul, I
want to worship God until my whole heart is filled
with the thought of His omnipotence. God is al-
mighty, and the Almighty God ofiPers Himself to
work in my heart, to do the work of keeping me;
and I want to get linked with Omnipotence, or
rather, linked to the Omnipotent One, to the living
God, and to have my place in the hollow of His
hand. You read the Psalms, and you think of the
wonderful thoughts in many of the expressions that
David uses; as, for instance, when he speaks about
God being our God, our Fortress, our Refuge, our
Strong Tower, our Strength, and our Salvation.
David had very wonderful views of how the everlast-
ing God is Himself the hiding=place of the believing
soul, and of how He takes the believer and keeps
him in the very hollow of His hand, in the secret of
His pavilion, under the shadow of His wings, under
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His very feathers. And there David lived. And
oh, we who are the children of Pentecost, we who
have known Christ and His blood and the Holy
Ghost sent down from heaven, why is it we know so
little of what it is to walk tremblingly step by step
with the Almighty God as our Keeper?
Have you ever thought that in every action of
grace in your heart you have the whole omnipotence
of God engaged to bless you? When I come to a
man and he bestows upon me a gift of money, I get
it and go away with it. He has given me something
of his; the rest he keeps for himself. But that is
not the way with the power of God. God can part
with nothing of His own power, and therefore I can
experience the power and goodness of God only so
far as I am in contact and fellowship with Himself;
and when I come into contact and fellowship with
Himself I come into contact and fellowship with the
whole omnipotence of God, and have the omnipo-
tence of God to help me every day.
A son has, perhaps, a very rich father, and as the
former is about to commence business the father
says: "You can have as much money as you want
for your undertaking." All the father has is at the
disposal of the son. And that is the way with God,
your Almighty God. You can hardly take it in; you
feel yourself such a little worm. His omnipotence
needed to keep a little worm! Yes, His omnipotence
is needed to keep every little worm that lives in the
dust, and also to keep the universe, and therefore
His omnipotence is much more needed in keeping
your soul and mine from the power of sin.
Oh, if you want to grow in grace, do learn to be-
100 KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD
gin here. In all your judgings and meditations and
thoughts and deeds and questionings and studies and
prayers, learn to be kept by your Almighty God.
What is Almighty God not going to do for the child
that trusts Him? The Bible says: "Above all that
we can ask or think." It is Omnipotence you must
learn to know and trust, and then you will live as a
Christian ought to live. How little we have learned
to study God, and to understand that a godly life is
a life full of God, a life that loves God and waits on
Him, and trusts Him, and allows Him to bless it!
We cannot do the will of God except by the power
of God. God gives us the first exx3erience of His
power to prepare us to long for more, and to come
and claim all that He can do. God help us to trust
Him every day.
Another thought. This keeping is not only alMn-
clusive and omnipotent, but also
CONTINUOUS AND UNBROKEN.
People sometimes say: "For a week or a month
God has kept me very wonderfully: I have lived in
the light of His countenance, and I cannot say what
joy I have not had in fellowship with Him. He has
blessed me in my work for others. He has given me
souls, and at times I felt as if I were carried heaven-
wards on eagle wings. But it did not continue. It
was too good; it could not last." And some say:
" It was necessary that I should fall to keep me hum-
ble." And others say: "I know it was my own
fault; but somehow you cannot always live up in the
heights."
Oh beloved, why is it? Can there be any reason
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why the keeping of God should not be continuous
and unbroken? Just think. All life is in unbroken
continuity. If my life were stopped for half an hour
I would be dead, and my life gone. Life is a contin-
uous thing, and the life of God is the life of His
Church, and the life of God is His almighty power
working in us. And God comes to us as the Al-
mighty One, and without any condition He offers to
be my Keeper, and His keeping means that day by
day, moment by moment, God is going to keep us.
If I were to ask you the question: " Do you think
God is able to keep you one day from actual trans-
gression?" you would answer: "I not only know He
is able to do it, but I think He has done it. There
have been days in which He has kept my heart in
His holy presence, when, though I have always had a
sinful nature within me. He has kept me from con-
scious, actual transgression."
Now, if He can do that for an hour or a day, why
not for two days? Oh! let us make God's omnipo-
tence as revealed in His word the measure of our ex-
pectations. Has God not said in His Word: *' I, the
Lord, do keep it, and will water it every moment"?
What can that mean? Does " every moment " mean
every moment? Did God promise of that vineyard
of red wine that every moment He would water it so
that the heat of the sun and the scorching wind
might never dry it up? Yes. In South Africa they
sometimes make a graft, and above it they tie a bot-
tle of water, so that now and then there shall be a
drop to saturate what they have put about it. And so
the moisture is kept there unceasingly until the graft
has had time to strike, and resist the heat of the sun.
102 KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD
Will our God, in His tender-hearted love towards
us, not keep us every moment when He has promised
to do so? Oh! if we once got hold of the thought:
Our whole religious life is to be Grod's doing — " It is
God that worketh in us to will and to do of His
good pleasure " — when once we get faith to expect
that from God, God wdll do all for us.
The keeping is to be continuous. Every morning
God will meet you as you wake. It is not a question:
If I forgot to wake in the morning with the thought
of Him, wdiat will come of it? If you trust your
w^aking to God, God will meet you in the morning as
you w^ake with His divine sunshine and love, and He
will give you the consciousness that through the day
you have got God to take charge of you continuously
with His almighty power. And God will meet you
the next day and every day; and never mind if in the
practice of fellowship there comes failure sometimes.
If you maintain your position and say: " Lord, I am
going to expect Thee to do Thy utmost, and I am
going to trust Thee day by day to keep me absolute-
ly," your faith will grow stronger and stronger, and
you will know the keeping power of God in unbro-
kenness.
II.
And now the other side — Believing. "Kept by
the power of God through faith. ''^ How must we look
at this faith?
Let me say, first of all, that this faith means
UTTER IMPOTENCE AND HELPLESSNESS BEFORE GOD.
At the bottom of all faith there is a feeling of help-
KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD 103
lessness. If I have a bit of business to transact, per-
haps to buy a house, the conveyancer must do the
work of getting the transfer of the property in my
name, and making all the arrangements. I cannot
do that work, and in trusting that agent I confess I
cannot do it. And so faith always means helplessness.
In many cases it means : I can do it with a great deal
of trouble, but another can do it better. But in most
cases it is utter helplessness; another must do it for
me. And that is the secret of the spiritual life. A
man must learn to say: "I give up everything; I
have tried and longed, and thought and prayed, but
failure has come. God has blessed me and helped
me, but still, in the long run, there has been so much
of sin and sadness." What a change comes when a
man is thus broken down into utter helplessness and
self=despair, and says: " I can do nothing!"
Remember Paul. He was living a blessed life, and
he had been taken up into the third heaven, and then
the thorn in the flesh came, " a messenger of Satan to
buffet him." And what happened? Paul could not
understand it, and he prayed the Lord three times to
take it away; but the Lord said, in effect:
"No; it is possible thou mightest exalt thyself, and
therefore I have sent thee this trial to keep thee weak
and humble."
And Paul then learned a lesson that he never for-
got, and that was — to rejoice in his infirmities. He
said that the weaker he was the better it was for him,
for w^hen he was weak he was strong in his Lord
Christ.
Do you want to enter what people call " the higher
life "? Then go a step lower down. I remember Dr.
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Boardman telling how that once he was invited by a
gentleman to go and see some works where they
made fine shot, and I believe the workmen did .'.o by
pouring down molten lead from a great height. This
gentlemam wanted to take Dr. Boardman up to the
top of the tower to see how the work was done. The
doctor came to the, tower, he entered by the door, and
began going upstairs; but when he had gone a few
steps the gentleman called out:
" That is the wrong way. You must come down
this way; that stair is locked up."
The gentleman took him downstairs a good many
steps, and there an elevator was ready to take him to
the top; and he said:
" I have learned a lesson that going down is often
the best way to get up."
Ah yes, God will have to bring us very low down;
there will have to come upon us a sense of emptiness
and despair and nothingness. It is when we sink
down in utter helplessness that the everlasting God
will reveal Himself in His power, and that our hearts
will learn to trust God alone.
What is it that keeps us from trusting Him per-
fectly?
Many a one says: "I believe what you say, but
there is one difficulty. If my trust were perfect and
always abiding, all would come right, for I know God
will honor trust. But how am I to get that trust? "
My answer is: ''By the death of self. The great
hindrance to trust is self=effort. So long as you have
got your own wisdom and thoughts and strength,
you cannot fully trust God. But when God breaks
you down, when everything begins to grow dim be-
KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD 105
fore your eyes, and you see that you understand
nothing, then God is coming nigh, and if you will
bow 'down in nothingness and wait upon God, He
will become all."
As long as we are something, God cannot be all,
and His omnipotence cannot do its full work, That
is the beginning of faith — utter despair of self, a
ceasing from man and everything on earth, and find-
ing our hope in God alone.
And then, next, we must understand that faith is
REST.
In the beginning of the faith-life, faith is strug-
gling; but as long as faith is struggling, faith has
not attained its strength. But when faith in its
struggling gets to the end of itself, and just throws
itself upon God and rests on Him, then comes joy
and victory.
Perhaps I can make it plainer if I tell the story
of how the Keswick Convention began. Canon Bat-
tersby was an evangelical clergyman of the Church of
England for more than twenty years, a man of deep
and tender godliness, but he had not the conscious-
ness of rest and victory over sin, and often was deeply
sad at the thought of stumbling and failure and sin.
When he heard about the possibility of victory, he
felt it was desirable, but it was as if he could not at-
tain to it. On one occasion, he heard an address on
" Rest and Faith, " from the story of the nobleman
who came from Capernaum to Cana to ask Christ to
heal his child. In the address it was shown that the
nobleman believed that Christ could help him in a
general way, but he came to Jesus a good deal by
106 KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD
way of an experiment. He hoped Christ would help
him, but he had not any assurance of that help.
But what happened? When Christ said to him:
" Go thy way, for thy child liveth, " that man be-
lieved the word that Jesus spoke; he rested in that
word. He had no proof that his child was well
again, and he had to walk back seven hours' journey
to Capernaum. He walked back, and on the way met
his servant, and got the first news that the child was
well, that at one o'clock on the afternoon of the pre-
vious day, at the very time that Jesus spoke to him,
the fever left the child. That father rested upon the
word of Jesus and His work, and he went down to
Capernaum and found his child well; and he praised
God, and became with his whole house a believer and
disciple of Jesus.
Oh, friends, that is faith! When God comes to
me with the promise of His keeping, and I have
nothing on earth to trust in, I say to God: "Thy
word is enough; kept by the power of God." That
is faith, that is rest.
When Canon Battersby heard that address, he
went home that night, and in the darkness of the
night found rest. He rested on the word of Jesus.
And the next morning, in the streets of Oxford, he
said to a friend: " I have found it! " Then he went
and told others, and asked that the Keswick Conven-
tion might be begun, and those at the Convention
with himself should testify simply what God had
done.
It is a great thing when a man comes to rest on
God's almighty power for every moment of his life,
in prospect of temptations to temper and haste and
KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD 107
anger and unlovingness and pride and sin. It is a
great thing in prospect of these to enter into a cove-
nant with the omnipotent Jehovah, not on account of
anything that any man says, or of anything that my
heart feels, but on the strength of the Word of God:
" Kept by the povrer of God through faith. "
Oh, let us say to God that we are going to prove
Him to the very uttermost. Let us say: We ask
Thee for nothing more than Thou canst give, but we
want nothing less. Let us say: My God, let my
life be a proof of what the omnipotent God can do,
Let these be the two dispositions of our souls every
day — deep helplessness, and simple, childlike rest.
That brings me to just one more thought in regard
to faith — faith implies
FELLOWSHIP WITH GOD.
Many people want to take the Word and believe
that, and they find they cannot believe it. Ah no!
you cannot separate God from His Word. No good-
ness or power can be received separate from God, and
if you want to get into this life of godliness you must
take time for fellowship with God.
People sometimes tell me: "My life is one of
such scurry and bustle that I have no time for fellow-
ship with God." A dear missionary said to me:
"People do not know how we missionaries are
tempted. I get up at five o'clock in the morning,
and there are the natives waiting for their orders for
work. Then I have to go to the school and spend
hours there; and then there is other work, and six-
teen hours rush along, and I hardly get time to be
alone with God."
108 KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD
Ah! there is the want. I pray you, remem-
ber two things. I have not told you to trust the om-
nipotence of God as a thing, and I have not told you
to trust the Word of God as a w^ritten book, but I
have told you to go to the God of omnipotence and
the God of the Word. Deal with God as that noble-
man dealt with the living Christ. Why was he able
to believe the word that Christ spoke to him ? Because
in the very eyes and tones and voice of Jesus, the Son
of God, he saw and heard something which made
him feel that he could trust Him. And that is what
Christ can do for you and me. Do not try to stir
and arouse faith from within. How often I have
tried to do that, and made a fool of myself! You
cannot stir up faith from the depths of your heart.
Leave your heart, and look into the face of Christ,
and listen to what He tells you about how He will
keep you. Look up into the face of your loving
Father, and take time every day with Him, and begin
a new life with the deep emptiness and poverty of a
man who has got nothing, and who wants to get every-
thing from Him; with the deep restfulness of a man
who rests on the living God, the omnipotent Jehovah ;
and try God, and prove Him if He will not open the
windows of heaven and pour out a blessing that there
shall not be room to receive it.
I close by asking if you are willing to experience
to the very full the heavenly keeping for the heaven-
ly inheritance? Kobert Murray M'Cheyne says,
somewhere: " Oh, God, make me as holy as a par-
doned sinner can be made." And if that prayer is in
your heart, come now, and let us enter into a covenant
with the everlasting and omnipotent Jehovah afresh,
KEPT BY THE POWER OF GOD 109
and in great helplessness, but in great restfulness,
place ourselves in His hands. And then as we enter
into our covenant, let us have the one prayer — that
we may believe fully that the everlasting God is
going to be our Companion, holding our hand every
moment of the day; our Keeper, watching over us
without a moment's interval; our Father, delighting
to reveal Himself in our souls always. He has the
power to let the sunshine of His love be with us all
the day. Do not be afraid because you have got
your business that you cannot have God with you
always. Learn the lesson that the natural sun shines
upon you all the day, and you enjoy its light, and
wherever you are you have got the sun; God takes
care that it shines upon you. And God will take
care that His own divine light shines upon you,
and that you shall abide in that light, if you will
only trust Him for it. Let us trust God to do that
with a great and entire trust.
Here is the omnipotence of God, and here is faith
reaching out to the measure of that omnipotence.
Shall we not say: " All that that omnipotence can do,
I am going to trust my God for " ? Are not the two
sides of this heavenly life wonderful? God's omnip-
otence covering me, and my will in its littleness
resting in that omnipotence, and rejoicing in it!
Moment by moment, I'm kept in His love;
Moment by moment, I've life from above;
Looking to Jesus, the glory doth shine;
Moment by moment. Oh Lord, I am Thine!
"YE ARE THE BRANCHES."
AN ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS.
Everything depends on our being right ourselves
in Christ. If I want good apples, I must have a
good apple=tree; and if I care for the health of the
appleHree, the apj)le^tree will give me good apples.
And it is just so with our Christian life and work.
If our life ivUh Christ he right, all will come right.
There may be the need of instruction and suggestion
and help and training in the different departments
of the work; all that has its value. But in the long
run, the greatest essential is to have the full life in
Christ; in other words, to have Christ in us, working
through us. I know how much there is often to
disturb us, or to cause anxious questionings; but the
Master has such a blessing for every one of us, and
such perfect peace and rest, and such joy and strength,
if we can only come into, and be kept in, the right
attitude towards Him.
I will take my text from the parable of the Vine
and the Branches, in John xv: 5: ''I am the vine, ye
are the branches." Especially these words: "Ye are
the branches."
What a simple thing it is to be a branch, the
branch of a tree, or the branch of a vine! The
branch grows out of the vine, or out of the tree, and
there it lives and grows, and in due time, bears fruit.
It has no responsibility except just to receive from
110
" YE ARE THE BRANCHES'' 111
the root and stem sap and nourishment. And if we
only by the Holy Spirit knew our relationship to
Jesus Christ, our work would be changed into the
brightest and most heavenly thing upon earth. In-
stead of there ever being soul^weariness or exhaustion,
our work would be like a new experience, linking us
to Jesus as nothing else can. For, alas! is it not
often true that our work comes between us and
Jesus? What folly! The very work that He has to
do in me, and I for Him, I take up in such a way
that it separates me from Christ. Many a laborer in
the vineyard has complained that he has too much
work, and not time for close communion with Jesus,
and that his usual work weakens his inclination for
prayer, and that his too much intercourse with men
darkens the spiritual life. Sad thought, that the
bearing of fruit should separate the branch from the
vine! That must be because we have looked upon
our work as something else than the branch bearing-
fruit. May God deliver us from every false thought
about the Christian life.
Now, just a few thoughts about this blessed
BKANCH^LIFE.
In the first place, it is
A LIFE OF ABSOLUTE DEPENDENCE.
The branch has nothing; it just depends upon the
vine for everything. That word ahsolnte dependence
is one of the most solemn and large and precious of
words. A great German theologian wrote two large
volumes some years ago to show that the whole of
Calvin's theology is summed up in that one principle
of ahsolnte dependence upon God; and he was right.
112 " YE ARE THE BRANCHES''
Another great writer has said that absolide, unalter-
able dependence upon God alone is the essence of
the religion of angels, and should be that of men also.
God is everything to the angels, and He is willing to
be everything to the Christian. If I can learn every
moment of the day to depend upon God, everything
will come right. You w^ill get the higher life if you
depend absolutely upon God.
Now, here we find it with the vine and the
branches. Every vine you ever see, or every bunch
of grapes that comes upon your table, let it remind
you that the branch is absolutely dependent on the
vine. The vine has to do the work, and the branch
enjoys the fruit of it.
What has the vine to do? It has to do a great
work. It has to send its roots out into the soil and
hunt under the ground — the roots often extend a
long way out — for nourishment, and to drink in the
moisture. Put certain elements of manure in certain
directions, and the vine sends its roots there, and
then in its roots or stems it turns the moisture and
manure into that special sap which is to make the
fruit that is borne. The vine does the work, and the
branch has just to receive from the vine the sap,
which is changed into grapes. I have been told that
at Hamilton Court, London, there is a vine that some-
times bore a couple of thousand bunches of grapes,
and people were astonished at its large growth and
rich fruitage. Afterwards it was discovered what
was the cause of it. Not so very far away runs the
Eiver Thames, and the vine had stretched its roots
away hundreds of yards under the ground, until it
had come to the river^side, and there in all the rich
" YE ARE THE BRANCHES'' 113
slime of the river=bed it had found rich nourishment,
and obtained moisture, and the roots had drawn the
sap all that distance up and up into the vine, and as
a result there was the abundant and rich harvest.
The vine had the work to do, and the branches had
just to depend upon the vine, and receive what it
gave.
Is that literally true of my Lord Jesus? Must
I understand that when I have to work, when I
have to preach a sermon, or address a Bible class, or
to go out and visit the i^oor neglected ones, that all
the responsibility of the work is on Christ?
That is exactly what Christ wants you to under-
stand. Christ wants that in all your work, the very
foundation should be the simple, blessed conscious-
ness: Christ must care for all.
And how docs He fulfil the trust of that depend-
ence? He does it by sending down the Holy Spirit
- — not now and then only as a special gift, for remem-
ber the relation between the vine and the branches
is such that hourly, daily, unceasingly there is the
living connection maintained. The saj^ does not flow
for a time, and then stop, and then flow again, but
from moment to moment the sap flows from the vine
to the branches. And just so, my Lord Jesus wants
me to take that blessed position as a worker, and
morning by morning and day by day and hour by
hour and step by step, in every work I have to go out
to, just to abide before Him in the simple utter help-
lessness of one who knows nothing, and is nothing,
and can do nothing. Oh, beloved workers, study that
word nothing. You sometimes sing: '' Oh to be noth-
ing, nothing"; but have you really studied that word,
114 "YE ARE THE BRANCHES »
and prayed every day, and worshiped God, in the
light of it? Do you know the blessedness of that
word nothing 9
If I am something, then God is not everything;
but when I become nothing, God can become all, and
the everlasting God in Christ can reveal Himself
fully. That is the higher life. We need to become
nothing. Someone has well said that the seraphim
and cherubim are flames of fire because they know
they are nothing, and they allow God to put His
fulness and His glory and brightness into them.
They are nothing, and God is all in them and around
them. Oh, become nothing in deep reality, and, as
a worker, study only one thing — to become poorer
and lower and more helpless, that Christ may work
all in you.
Workers, here is your first lesson : learn to be noth-
ing, learn to be helpless. The man who has got
something is not absolutely dependent; but the man
who has got nothing is absolutely dependent. Abso-
lute dependence upon God is the secret of all power
in work. The branch has nothing but what it gets
from the vine, and you and I can have nothing but
what we get from Jesus.
But secondly, the life of the branch is not only a
life of entire dependence, but of
DEEP EESTFULNESS.
Oh that little branch, if it could think, and if it
could feel, and if it could speak — that branch away
in Hampton Court vine, or on some of the million
vines that we have in South Africa, in our sunny land
— if we could have a little branch here to-day to talk
" YE ARE THE BRANCHES'' 115
to US, and if v/e could say: "Come, branch of the
vine, I want to learn from thee how I can l3e a true
branch of the living Vine," w4iat would it answer?
The little branch would whisper:
" Man, I hear that you are wise, and I know that
you can do a great many wonderful things. I know
you have much strength and wisdom given to you,
but I have one lesson for you. With all your hurry
and effort in Christ's work you never prosper. The
first thing you need is to come and rest in your Lord
Jesus. That is what I do. Since I grew out of that
vine I have spent years and years, and all I have
done is just to rest in the vine. When the time of
spring came I had no anxious thought or care. The
vine began to pour its sap into me, and to give the
bud and leaf. And when the time of summer came
I had no care, and in the great heat I trusted the
vine to bring moisture to keep me fresh. And in the
time of harvest, when the owner came to pluck the
grapes, I had no care. If there was anything in the
grapes not good, the owner never blamed the branch;
the blame was always on the vine. And if you would
be a true branch of Christ, the living Vine, just rest
on Him. Let Christ bear the responsibility."
You say: " Won't that make me slothful? "
I tell you it will not. No one who learns to rest up-
on the living Christ can become slothful, for the clos-
er your contact with Christ the more of the Spirit of
His zeal and love will be borne in upon you. But oh,
begin to w^ork in the midst of your entire dependence
by adding to that dec}} restfulness. A man, some-
times tries and tries to be dependent upon Christ,
but he worries himself about this absolute depend-
116 " YE ARE THE BRANCHES''
ence; he tries and he cannot get it. But let him
sink down into entire restfulness every day.
In Thy strong hand I lay me down.
So shall the work be done;
For who can work so wondrously
As the Almighty One?
Worker, take your place every day at the feet of
Jesus, in the blessed peace and rest that come from
the knowledge —
I have no care, my cares are His;
I have no fear, He cares for all my fears.
Come, children of God, and understand that it is
the Lord Jesus who wants to work through you. You
complain of the want of fervent love. It will come
from Jesus. He will give the divine love in your
heart with which you can love people. That is the
meaning of the assurance: "The love of God is shed
abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit"; and of
that other word: "The love of Christ constraineth
us." Christ can give you a fountain of love, so that
you cannot help loving the most wretched and the
most ungrateful, or those who have wearied you hith-
erto. Rest in Christ, who can give wisdom and
strength, and you do not know how that restfulness
will often prove to be the very best part of your mes-
sage. You plead with people and you argue, and
they get the idea: "There is a man arguing and
striving with me." They only feel: "Here are two
men dealing with each other." But it you will let
the deep rest of God come over you, the rest in Christ
Jesus, the peace and rest and holiness of heaven, that
restfulness will bring a blessing to the heart, even
more than the words you speak.
" YE ARE THE BRANCHES'' 117
But a third thought: The branch teaches a les-
son of
MUCH FRUITFULNESS.
You know the Lord Jesus repeated that word fruit
often in that parable. He spoke, first, of fruit, and
then of more fruit, and then of much fruit. Yes,
you are ordained not only to bear fruit, but to bear
much fruit. " Herein is my Father glorified, thcd ye
hear much fruit.'''' In the first place, Christ said: "I
am the Vine, and my Father is the Husbandman.
My Father is the Husbandman who has charge of me
and you," He who will watch over the connection
between Christ and the branches is God; and it is in
the power of God through Christ we are to bear fruit.
Oh Christians, you know this world is perishing for
the want of workers. And it wants not only more
workers. The workers are saying, some more earn-
estly than others: " We need not only more workers,
but we need that our workers should have a new
power, a different life; that we workers should be
able to bring more blessing." Children of God, I
appeal to you. You know what trouble you take, say,
in a case of sickness. You have a beloved friend
apparently in danger of death, and nothing can re-
fresh that friend so much as a few grapes, and they
are out of season; but what trouble you will take to
get the grapes that are to be the nourishment of this
dying friend! And oh, there are around you people
who never go to church, and so many who go to
church, but do not know Christ. And yet the heavenly
grapes, the grapes of Eshcol, the grapes of the heav-
enly Vine, are not to be had at any price, except as
118 " YE ARE THE BRANCHES "
the child of God bears them out of his inner life in
fellowship with Christ. Except the children of God
are filled with the sap of the heavenly Vine, except
they are filled with the Holy Spirit and the love of
Jesus, they cannot bear much of the real heavenly
grape. We all confess there is a great deal of work,
a great deal of preaching and teaching and visiting, a
great deal of machinery, a great deal of earnest ef-
fort of every kind; but there is not much manifesta-
tion of the power of God in it.
What is wanting? There is wanting the close con-
nection between the worker and the heavenly Vine.
Christ, the heavenly Vine, has blessings that He
could pour on tens of thousands who are perishing.
Christ, the heavenly Vine, has power to provide the
heavenly grapes. But " Ye are the branches," and
you cannot bear heavenly fruit unless you are in close
connection with Jesus Christ.
Do not confound loork and fruit . There may be a
good deal of work for Christ that is not the fruit of
the heavenly Vine, Do not seek for work only.
Oh! study this question of fruit=bearing. It means
tlie very life and the very power and the very spirit
and the very love within the heart of the Son of God
— it means the heavenly Vine Himself coming into
your heart and mine.
You know there are different sorts of grapes, each
with a different name, and every vine provides exact-
ly that peculiar aroma and juice which gives the
grape its particular flavor and taste. Just so, there is
in the heart of Christ Jesus a life, and a love, and a
Spirit, and a blessing, and a power for men, that are
" YE ARE THE BFANCHES'' 119
entirely heavenly and divine, and that will come
down into our hearts. Stand in close connection
with the heavenly Vine and say:
" Lord Jesus, nothing less than the sap that flows
through Thyself, nothing less than the Spirit of Thy
divine life is what we ask. Lord Jesus, I pray Thee
let Thy Spirit flow through me in all my work for
Thee."
I tell you again that the sap of the heavenly Vine
is nothing but the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is
the life of the heavenly Vine, and what you must get
from Christ is nothing less than a strong inflow of
the Holy Spirit. You need it exceedingly, and you
want nothing more than that. Remember that. Do
not expect Christ to give a bit of strength here, and
a bit of blessing yonder, and a bit of help over there.
As the vine does its work in giving its own peculiar
sap to the branch, so expect Christ to give His own
Holy Spirit into your heart, and then you will bear
much fruit. And if you have only begun to bear
fruit, and are listening to the word of Christ in the
parable, '' more fruit," " much fruit," remember that
in order that you should bear more fruit you just re-
quire more of Jesus in your life and heart.
We ministers of the gospel, how we are in danger
of getting into a condition of icorl^, tvoj^k, ivork! And
we pray over it, but the freshness and buoyancy and
joy of the heavenly life are not always present. Let
us seek to understand that the life of the branch is a
life of much fruit, because it is a life rooted in
Christ, the living, heavenly Vine.
A fourth thought: The life of the branch is
120 " YE ARE THE BRANCHES''
A LIFE OF CLOSE COMMUNION.
Let US again ask: What has the branch to do?
You know that precious inexhaustible word that
Christ used: Abide. Your life is to be an abiding
life. And how is the abiding to be? It is to be just
like the branch in the vine, abiding every minute of
the day. There are the branches, in close commun-
ion, in unbroken communion, with the vine, from
January to December. And cannot I live every day
— it is to me an almost terrible thing that we should
ask the question — cannot I live in abiding commun-
ion with the heavenly Vine?
You say: " But I am so much occupied with other
things "
You may have ten hours' hard work daily, during
which your brain has to be occupied with temporal
things; God orders it so. But the abiding work is
the work of the heart, not of the brain, the work of
the heart clinging to and resting in Jesus, a work in
which the Holy Spirit links us to Christ Jesus. Oh,
do believe that deeper down than the brain, deep
down in the inner life, you can abide in Christ, so
that every moment you are free the consciousness
will come:
" Blessed Jesus, I am still in Thee."
If you will learn for a time to put aside other work
and to get into this abiding contact with the heavenly
Vine, you will find that fruit will come.
What is the application to our life of this abiding
communion? What does it mean?
It means close felloicship tvith Christ in secret
prayer. I am sure there are Christians who do long
« YE ARE THE BRANCHES''' 121
for the higher life, and who soraetimes have got a
great blessing, and have at times found a great inflow
of heavenly joy and a great outflow of heavenly glad-
ness; and yet after a time it has passed away. They
have not understood that close personal actual com-
munion with Christ is an absolute necessity for daily
life. Take time to be alone with Christ. Nothing in
heaven or earth can free you from the necessity for
that, if you are to be happy and holy Christians.
Oh! how many Christians look upon it as a burden
and a tax, and a duty, and a difiiculty to get much
alone with God! That is the great hindrance to our
Christian life everywhere. We want more quiet fel-
lowship with God, and I tell you in the name of the
heavenly Vine that you cannot be healthy branches,
branches into which the heavenly saj) can flow, unless
you take plenty of time for communion with God. If
you are not willing to sacrifice time to get alone with
Him, and to give Him time every day to work in you,
and to keep up the link of connection between you
and Himself, He cannot give you that blessing of
His unbroken fellowship. Jesus Christ asks you to
live in close communion with Him. Let every heart
say: "Oh Christ, it is this I long for, it is this I
choose." And He will gladly give it you.
And then my last thought: The life of the branch
is
A LIFE OF ABSOLUTE SUREENDEK.
This word, absolute surrender, is a great and
solemn word, and I believe we do not understand its
meaning. But yet the little branch preaches it.
" Have you anything to do, little branch, besides
bearing grapes?"
122 ''YE ARE THE BRANCHES"
" No, nothing.^''
" Are you fit for nothing? "
Fit for nothing! The Bible says that a bit of vine
cannot even be used as a pen; it is fit for nothing but
to be burned.
" And now, what do you understand, little branch,
about your relation to the vine? "
"My relation is just this: I am utterly given up to
the vine, and the vine can give me as much or as
little sap as it chooses. Here I am at its disposal
and the vine can do with me what it likes."
Oh, friends, we want this absolute surrender to the
Lord Jesus Christ. The more I speak the more I
feel that this is one of the most difiicult points to
make clear, and one of the most important and need-
ful points to explain — what this absolute surrender is.
It is often an easy thing for a man or a number of
men to come out and offer themselves up to God for
entire consecration, and to say: " Lord, it is my desire
to give up myself entirely to Thee." That is of great
value, and often brings very rich blessing. But the
one question I ought to study quietly is:
WHAT IS MEANT BY ABSOLUTE SURRENDER?
It means that just as literally as Christ was given up
entirely to God, I am given up entirely to Christ. Is
that too strong? Some think so. Some think that
never can be; that just as entirely and absolutely as
Christ gave up His life to do nothing but seek the
Father's pleasure, and depend on the Father absolute-
ly and entirely, I am to do nothing but to seek the
pleasure of Christ. But that is actually true. Christ
Jesus came to breathe ' His own Spirit into us, to
" YE ARE THE BRANCHES'' 123
make us find our very highest happiness in living en-
tirely for God, just as He did. Oh, beloved brethren,
if that is the case, then I ought to siy:
" Yes, as true as it is of that little branch of the
vine, so true, by God's grace, I would liave it be of
me. I would live day by day Ihat Christ may be
able to do with me what He will."
Ah! here comes the terrible mistake that lies at the
bottom of so much of our own religion. A man
thinks :
" I have my business and family duties, and my
relations as a citizen, and all this I cannot change.
And now alongside all this I am to take in religion
and the service of God, as something that will keep
me from sin. God help me to perform my duties
properly!"
That is not right. When Christ came, He came
and bought the sinner with His blood. If there was
a slavennarket here and I were to buy a slave, I
should take that slave away to my own house from
his old surroundings, and he would live at my house
as my personal property, and I could order him about
all the day. And if he were a faithful slave, he would
live as having no will and no interests of his own, his
one care being to promote the welhbeing and honor
of his master. And in like manner I, who have been
bought with the blood of Christ, have been bought to
live every day with the one thought — How can I
please my Master?
Oh, w^e find the Christian life so difiicult because
we seek for God's blessing while we live in our own
will. We should be glad to live the Christian life
according to our own liking. We make our own
124 " YE ARE THE BRANCHES''
plans and choose our own work, and then we ask the
Lord Jesus to come in and take care that sin shall
not conquer us too much, and that we shall not go too
far wrong; we ask Him to come in and give us so
much of His blessing. But our relation to Jesus
ought to be such that we are entirely at His disposal,
and every day come to Him humbly and straightfor-
wardly and say:
" Lord, is there anything in me that is not accord-
ing to Thy will, that has not been ordered by Thee,
or that is not entirely given up to Thee?"
Oh, if we would wait and wait patiently, I tell you
what the result would be. There would spring up a re-
lationship between us and Christ so close and so tender
that we should afterwards be amazed at hov/ we for-
merly could have lived with the idea: "I am surren-
dered to Christ." We should feel how far distant
our intercourse with Him had previously been, and
that He can, and does indeed, come and take actual
possession of us, and gives unbroken fellowship all
the day. The branch calls us to absolute surrender.
I do not speak now so much about the giving up of
sins. There are people who need that, people who
have got violent tempers, bad habits, and actual sins
which they from time to time commit, and which
they have never given up into the very bosom of the
Lamb of God. I pray you, if you are branches of the
living Vine, do not keep one sin back. I know there
are a great many difficulties about this question of
holiness, I know that all do not think exactly the
same with regard to it. That would be to me a mat-
ter of comparative indifference if I could see that all
are honestly longing to be free from every sin. But
♦• YE ARE THE BRANCHES" 125
I am afraid that unconsciously there are in hearts
often compromises with the idea that we cannot be
without sin, we must sin a little every day; we cannot
help it. Oh that people would actually cry to God:
"Lord, do keep me from sin!" Give yourself ut-
terly to Jesus, and ask Him to do His very utmost
for you in keeping you from sin.
There is a great deal in our work, in our Church
and our surroundings that we found in the world
when we were born into it, and it has grown all round
us, and we think that it is all right, it cannot be
changed. We do not come to the Lord Jesus and
ask Him about it. Oh! I advise you. Christians,
hri7ig everything into relationsJiip with Jesus and
say:
"Lord, everything in my life has to be in most
comiDlete harmony with my position as a branch of
Thee, the blessed Vine."
Let your surrender to Christ be absolute. I do not
understand that word surrender fully; it gets new
meanings every now and then; it enlarges immensely
from time to time. But I advise you to speak it out:
"Absolute surrender to Thee, O Christ, is what I
have chosen." And Christ will show you what is not
according to His mind, and lead you on to deeper
and higher blessedness.
In conclusion, let me gather up all in one word.
Christ Jesus said: "I am the Vine, ye are the
branches." Li other words: "I, the living One who
have so completely given myself to you, am the Vine.
You cannot trust me too much. I am the Al-
mighty Worker, full of a divine life and power."
You are the branches of the Lord Jesus Christ. If
126 *' YE ARE THE BRANCHES"
there is in your heart the consciousness that you are
not a strong, healthy, fruit-bearing branch, not
closely linked with Jesus, not living in Him as
you should be — then listen to Him saying: " I am
the Vine, I will receive you, I will draw you to my-
self, I will bless you, I will strengthen you, I will
fill you with my Spirit. I, the Vine, have taken you
to be my branches, I have given myself utterly to
you; children, give yourselves utterly to me. I have
surrendered myself as God absolutely to you, I be-
came man and died for you that I might be entirely
yours. Come and surrender yourselves entirely to be
mine."
What shall our answer be? Oh, let it be a prayer
from the depths of our heart, that the living Christ
may take each one of us and link us close to Him-
self. Let our prayer be that He, the living Vine,
shall so link each of us to Himself that we shall go
away with our hearts singing: '• He is my Vine, and
I am His branch, — I want nothing more, — now I
have the everlasting Vine." Then, when you get
alone with Him, worship and adore Him, praise and
trust Him, love Him and wait for His love. " Thou
art my Vine, and I am Thy branch. It is enough,
my soul is satisfied."
Glory to His blessed name !
BY REV. F. B. MEYER
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