Part 6

The Bible is a living book. What it is to us depends on what we are to it. If we approach it with unbelief and sneers, it shudders like a wounded thing and closes up its heart, and we gaze only on a cold and gross exterior. We behold the form of its words, but discern not the treasures hidden in them. It appears cold and lifeless and repellent, and we go away depressed and unbelieving.

If we approach it reverently, trustfully, and confidently, it opens up to us its hidden depths. It shows to us its wonders. We may see in it unequaled beauties, unfading glories, magnificent vistas of thought; we may hear its voice of love, tender beyond words; we may feel the warmth of its affection, be uplifted by its hopefulness, and thrilled with the tones of its joy-bells.

If we open to it our heart’s door and pour out our treasures of affection, it in turn opens to us a great storehouse, and we may eat and be satisfied, and drink and thirst not. We may revel in its rich perfume, the rhythmic cadences of its music, the splendor of its heavenly light, and to us there is no question whether it is the living truth.

The Bible is to the Christian what the forest is to him who delights in nature. He who walks through the forest laughing, talking, and singing, hears not the sweet notes of the songster nor sees the wild things. He who would see and hear the things that delight the nature-lover must steal softly and silently along, watching his footsteps, hiding in the shadows, and thus he may see nature as she is. Likewise he who comes to the Bible full of self-importance with mind and heart self-centered sees not the natural beauty of the Bible. We must come to it effacing self, seeking not our own but the things of Christ, and we shall find it a mine of spiritual gold, a fountain of living water, a balm for every sorrow, a light in every dark hour—the one and only book that meets and satisfies the needs of the human soul.

TALK TEN. HEEDING INTUITIONAL WARNINGS

There are things which we know and feel but which do not result from our own study. We have a consciousness that there is some supreme power over us, and we are conscious of a certain responsibility to, and a dependence upon, this higher power. Reading the Bible and reasoning may give us clearer ideas of this power and our relations to it, but we have the consciousness of its existence without being taught.

This is never more clearly seen than in the case of the man who denies the existence of a personal God. As surely as he rejects the God of the Bible, he sets up something else in His place, and though he may call it by some other name than God, he will, nevertheless, attribute to it the powers and actions that belong to God. These intuitions by which we know without being conscious of how we know are given us by God for our protection and safety, and we ought to give careful heed to their testimony.

Sometimes our reason sees no harm in a thing, but we do not feel just right about it. A doctrine may look ever so plausible and be ever so interesting; but if we feel an inward uneasiness after consideration of it, there is a reason why we should be careful. Our intuition will often detect something wrong when our reason has not yet done so. These intuitions are not to be disregarded. They are God’s means of warning us against unseen dangers.

Sometimes when we come in contact with people, we see nothing outwardly wrong, but we have an inward feeling that all is not well. We feel that there is something wrong somewhere, even though we may be at a loss to know what it is. Sometimes we come in contact with a company of people and at once feel a strange something that we can not analyze; but we can not always trust our feelings. There are many things that influence us, and it is very easy to misinterpret them. Nor should we conclude that there is something very badly wrong with anyone merely because we have peculiar feelings when in his presence. There may be something wrong, however, and it behooves us to be on our guard. Sometimes it happens that such feelings arise when we are in the presence of people who are deeply tried, or discouraged, or suffering under the assaults of Satan.

There are many evil spirits at work in these days among professors of religion, and especially is this true among the various holiness factions. Have you ever gone into a meeting and felt that some way you did not “fit” there? The worshipers may have seemed joyful and may have said many good things, but all the while you felt an inward uneasiness. There was some reason for this, and whether the reason was spiritual or merely human, it was wise to exercise carefulness. It is usually best to refrain from trying to make yourself blend with anything when you have that internal sense of protest against it.

Fellowship is natural and spontaneous. It can not be forced. If you are straight and true and your heart is open and unprejudiced, you will usually have fellowship with whatever is of God. Most sectarian holiness people are so broad that they can take in almost anything and call it good. Beware of this spirit. God’s Spirit accepts only the good. If you have ease and freedom with true, established, spiritual people of God, and are free in meetings where the whole truth is preached and the Spirit of God works freely, and then when you come in contact with other professors you fail to have that freedom, do not accuse yourself nor try to force yourself to have fellowship with them.

A preacher once came into a certain community and began to preach. He was quite enthusiastic; he praised the Lord and shouted. He preached much truth and professed to be out clean for God. It was afterwards discovered that he was very crooked and wholly unworthy of confidence. I asked a number of the congregation later how it came that they received him. Their answer was that, as he came recommended by some good brethren and preached so much truth, when they did not feel right about him they came to the conclusion that they must be wrong and he right. So they accused themselves and went on through the meeting suffering under a heavy burden. They knew they had no such feelings when other ministers came into their midst, nor did they feel that way in their own ordinary meetings. But in spite of this, they took the wrong course, and the result was that the congregation received much harm both spiritually and financially. The same thing happened with this preacher in other places, till at length he came to a place where some refused to ignore their feelings or to accuse themselves of being in the wrong. Instead, they sent at once for two well-established ministers, and as soon as they came into the community, the crooked preacher fled and was seen no more in those parts.

Sometimes some one will come around making a high profession, and while we can see nothing wrong, we do not feel free with him, or, in other words, we have a sense of uneasiness. We feel at home with other saints, but not so with this person. Beware. If you are in fellowship with those whom you know to be true saints, look out for those with whom you do not have inward harmony. Do not blame yourself nor disregard the warning. Isolated Christians naturally become hungry for spiritual association. Sometimes they go to meetings where, while they find some good things, they also see other things and feel things that grate upon their spiritual sense of propriety. In such cases one should be guarded and should not try to “fit” with these things. To blend with them you must become like them; and if you become like them when they are not right, you will find that when you come into an assembly where the truth and Spirit have freedom, you will not blend there. If you ignore those inner warnings and accept something contrary to them, you will soon find yourself out of harmony with God’s church and without the liberty you used to have among the children of God.

Do not follow your intuitions blindly, but do not go contrary to them. Let your reason find out the way of action before you act, so that you may act wisely. But when that inward sense says to us, “Stop, look, listen,” we shall do well to heed its warning.

TALK ELEVEN. DOING SOMETHING WORTH WHILE

We all like to feel that what we are doing counts for something, that it is really worth while. We like to see practical results. We know that much labor is lost in the world, and we do not want ours to be lost. The ordinary things of life seem to amount to so little. They are not spectacular; no one pays very much attention to them; and we naturally feel that when we do something, we want it to be something that people can see and that they will think is worth while, and something that we ourselves can feel is worth while. Some think: “If I could just preach, I shouldn’t mind working for the Lord. But, oh! I can do so little—nothing worth while at all, nothing worth the effort. What can my feeble efforts accomplish, anyway?”

Others think that if they could go to a foreign land and work among the heathen, draw people to Christ there, send back home great reports of what they have accomplished, have their names published in the paper, and have people talking about them, then that would be worth while. But since they are only ordinary people and can do only ordinary things, it seems to them that it hardly pays to try. They will just follow the line of least resistance and do things the easiest way. Of course they want to do what they can for God, but they want to do something really worth while.

And now, reader, what is really worth while in life? Is it only those things that make a great show? is it only those things that the world counts great? A sister said to me recently in a letter, “I used to think that I could do nothing worth while, but I have found that just simply living salvation before people is a great work.” Now, that sister has learned a wonderful lesson. She has found a truth so great that most people do not recognize it as truth when they do find it. It is one of those truths that have the peculiarity of seeming small and insignificant though they are the very fundamentals of truth.

Just simply living salvation before people—yes, that is what counts, and it counts more than anything else. That is one of the very greatest things that an individual has ever done in this world. Talk is cheap, and many people can talk all day and say scarcely anything either. Some people can sway great crowds by their eloquence, they can accomplish wonderful things, but still they can not live salvation, or, at least, they do not. There is no power so great in this world as the simple power of a holy, quiet life. The sister mentioned can never hope to do great things as other people might count them. She is in frail health; she is isolated from other saints and can not attend meetings as can many others; she has not the ability to preach or to do anything very great, as greatness is usually reckoned; but she has learned the great fact that she is not shut out from doing a grand work.

If all God’s people could learn this lesson—if they could learn that it really counts just simply to live right, just simply to be an ordinary every-day Christian; if they could once get that thoroughly fixed in their minds and hearts—it would glorify their lives, it would exalt the common service, it would shed a halo over their lives, and they would not feel discouraged.

When Moses was at Pharaoh’s court, I suppose he thought that he was doing something really worth while. He amounted to something there. But when the Lord let him be driven, or rather frightened, away from that court and he went out into the wilderness, I suppose he thought his occupation there was hardly worth while. Why, what was he doing, anyway? Just taking care of the sheep, leading them out in the morning to the pasture, bringing them back to the fold at night, seven days in the week—just doing this and nothing more. I suppose it did not look very big to Moses, but it did to God. God thought it worth so much that he kept him at that work for forty years. Then Moses, at the age of eighty, when it looked as if he were about done with this world, was called to go to do something for the Lord. That forty years in the wilderness counted now. It had given him experience that helped to qualify him for the work to which God had called him. He came out of there worth while because he had done something worth while in those years. He had learned about God—oh, so many things he had learned! and now he was ready to put that knowledge into practise.

Sometimes we have wilderness periods in our lives, when God lets us be shut up in a corner, as it were, and do the little things that do not seem to count. But they count on us if they do not count anywhere else. There is one thing—and just one—that stands out above all other things in the human life, and that is faithfulness. No matter what our life may be, nor where we may be, nor what is our situation, if we are just faithful it is sure to count, and to count a great deal. That is one thing that you can do: you can be faithful to the Lord. You can do what he wants you to do. You can live pure, holy, undefiled, and keep shining every day, no matter what the circumstances may be. Just remember to keep shining. That is the thing that counts. Keep living clean and as God wants you to live. If you do this, he will know where he can find somebody who is faithful when he wants something else done. But ever keep this before you: there is no greater nor more necessary work in the world than putting the truth of God into visible form in a pure and quiet life.

TALK TWELVE. HOME-MADE CLOUDS

Louise stood looking out of the window with unseeing eyes. There was a troubled expression upon her face. There were tears in her eyes, and a lump in her throat. What was the trouble? An hour before she had been singing as blithely as a song-bird. Her morning devotions had been sweet. The presence of God had been with her. The day had started out full of sunshine, but alas! now her sky was clouded.

It had all happened in a moment. Her younger brother had been playing with his dog and had carelessly run against the stand upon which her flower-pots were sitting and had upset one of the choice plants, breaking the pot and ruining the flower. Louise saw the happening. How careless it was of the boy! Quickly a feeling of impatience arose, and before she realized what she was doing, she had spoken sharply to her brother and had said hasty words that she immediately regretted. Her conscience quickly reproved her. She felt bad over the loss of the flower, but she felt much worse over her hasty words. A dark, heavy cloud settled down upon her. The sunshine was all gone; there was no longer any song in her heart, but heaviness instead.

Standing there by the window, she now meditated over it. Oh, if she had been more tender! If she had only exercised more self-control! If she had kept back those hasty words! It was quite true that Tom had been very careless. Still, she knew that he too loved the flowers. He did not mean to destroy one. Louise loved Tom, and because of this she felt all the more deeply what she had done. He was gone now, she knew not where. She would be glad to apologize to him and beg his pardon if he were there. She decided that she would tell him as soon as he returned, and that gave her some satisfaction, but it did not take away the cloud. She thought of how bright the morning and how light and care-free her heart had been! But now her day was clouded, and worst of all, she had made the cloud herself, by her own haste.

That is often the way it is with us. We make so many of our own clouds in life. Clouds often come over our lives from the actions of others; sometimes they come through circumstances that can not be helped; sometimes they come from Satan himself. Such clouds as these do not have the effect upon us that our home-made clouds do. The things that are hardest to bear are the things that we feel we have brought upon ourselves. These get closer to us than anything else. They have a sting to them that nothing else has. Many times people do things that try us; but if we also do or say something hastily at that time, it will increase our trial and make it the more difficult to bear. It will make the clouds that come all the darker. If we have not been as kind as we ought to have been, if there has been a sharpness in our words, or if we have manifested our displeasure at something in a way that showed our feelings too much, it is sure to bring a cloud over our day.

The more tender our consciences, the more we shall feel these things and the more the tendency will be to cloud our days. It is true that we shall feel displeased over things, and it is very natural to manifest our displeasure in some way. Some people are very impulsive and speak before they stop to think what they are saying or what the result will be, and thus they are continually making clouds for themselves. There are times when we must resolutely take hold of ourselves when the feeling of displeasure comes, as it is sure to do. The will must grapple with these emotions quickly and not let them get into action. Our wills were given us to rule ourselves with. When tempted to be unkind or to be hasty in our words and actions, we should say within ourselves: “I will not speak hasty words. I will control myself and keep sweet. I will be patient; I will be kind. I will do as the Lord would have me to do.” Then we should put these resolutions quickly into action. Instead of the trial bringing a cloud over us, the fact that we have conquered ourselves and kept ourselves in the attitude that we should hold toward God and toward others will make the sunshine all the brighter.