It is a dreadful thing to be choked. Those who have either by
accident or design suffered partial strangulation tell us that
it is one of the most dreadful experiences. It must, to the
all-seeing eye of God, be a dreadful thing to behold so many
of His children gasping for a breath of life, being choked
by the evil weeds, thorns, and tares indigenous to the flesh
or diligently planted there by the enemy of souls while they
sleep. It is a sad thing to see the corners of a corn-field left
unreaped during the harvest (because the grain growing there
among the thorns is not worth reaping), afterward reaped down
and bound in bundles and burned, the thorns and choked product
of a good seed together. It is a sadder thing to behold the
lives of not a few Christians all overgrown and choked with
thorns and weeds just ripening for the fire of destruction,
because they are shriveled and choked and not fit to be gathered
into our Lord’s garner. (Text.)--_The Independent._
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