“I will cause you to walk in My statutes” (Eze. xxxvi. 27).
The highest spiritual condition is one where life is spontaneous and flows
without effort, like the deep floods of Ezekiel’s river, where the
struggles of the swimmer ceased, and he was borne by the current’s
resistless force.
So God leads us into spiritual conditions and habits which become the
spontaneous impulses of our being, and we live and move in the fulness of
the divine life.
But these spiritual habits are not the outcome of some transitory impulse,
but are often slowly acquired and established. They begin, like every true
habit, in a definite act of will, and they are confirmed by the repetition
of that act until it becomes a habit. The first stages always involve
effort and choice. We have to take a stand and hold it steadily, and after
we have done so a certain time, it becomes second nature, and carries us
by its own force.
The Holy Spirit is willing to form such habits in every direction of our
Christian life, and if we will but obey Him in the first steppings of
faith, we will soon become established in the attitude of obedience, and
duty will be delight.