HINDRANCES TO HOLINESS.
I shall try, in the short time I may occupy, to go straight to the
point--to some of the difficulties and hindrances which I know are
keeping not a few here to-day out of the enjoyment of the blessing. I
know there are some here who are satisfied that this blessing is
attainable, who are satisfied that God can thus keep them, as we have
been singing, if they were to lean the whole weight of their
need--their soul, and body, and spirit--upon Him, and trust Him. They
believe He could, and they believe He would. They have come to
perceive that it is not at all a question of human strength, or human
weakness, or human knowledge, but that it is simply a matter of
Divine strength, fully recognized and fully trusted by human
weakness. Therefore, there is no more a stumbling-block in their way
about reckoning themselves holier than other people, or stronger than
other people, for they recognize themselves as the very weakest and
most sinful of _all_ people: but they have come to understand
this blessing to be human weakness, leaning with all its weight upon
Divine power; and they believe God does thus save and keep those
people who do thus lean. Then, what hinders? There they stand, just
where the Israelites stood, when they might have gone in and
possessed the good land. "They entered not in because of unbelief,"
and for that unbelief there is a reason--a cause. They dare not
venture their souls on this Divine power, because there is back in
their consciousness some difficulty, some obstacle, something which
is only known to themselves and the Holy Ghost, which prevents them
from doing this.
When they try to jump on to the Divine strength there is something
that holds them back, and they cannot make the spring. They try to
forget it--they sing, and pray, and seek, to make themselves believe
there is nothing, and they come up again and again right to the
entrance of the goodly land, and then they try to spring in. Some of
you will today, but you will not be able to spring, because there is
something holding you back; and you are conscious of it, but will not
allow yourselves to realize it. Now this is the point, when my dear
husband read that passage, "When they had prayed, the place was
shaken," I thought, Oh! what was involved in that prayer--what does
that mean? _Why_ did the glory come? Why did the Holy Ghost
overshadow them? Why were they filled with God--so filled that they
had to go down and could not help themselves, but went into the
streets and poured it out upon the godless multitudes around them?
_Why, why_ did it come? Why do hundreds of assemblies of God's
people meet and pray, but nothing comes? They hold long meetings, and
make long prayers, and sing,
"We are waiting for the fire;"
but nothing comes! Why did it come on that particular occasion?
Because in that prayer was thorough, entire, everlasting
self-abandonment. They came up caring for nothing but pleasing God
and doing as He bade them; and the Holy Ghost alone knows when a soul
arrives at that point. He will never come till the soul _does_
arrive at that point. This is the deficiency, I am satisfied, with
hundreds. There they stand, right on the borders of the glory-land,
but there is some wedge of gold, or Babylonish garment that they
buried years ago.
They won't think about it. They say, "Oh, it is nought, nought! That
little thing would not hinder, it is so long ago." They would not,
when they knew they ought, dig it up and burn it before the Lord. If
this is so with any here, you _must_ dig it up, or the Holy Ghost will
never come. A lady, a short time ago, was brought up to the very edge of
this blessing, but there was something she felt she ought to do. She had
a sum of money which she felt ought to be given up to a certain object.
She prayed and struggled, and attended prayer-meetings, and prayed long
into the night; but, no, she would not face the difficulty. She said,
"Oh! no; I am not satisfied in my own mind. How do I know God wants it
for that purpose?" She might have struggled till now if she had not made
up her mind to obey; but, the moment she did--alone, up in her bedroom,
the blessing came. A gentleman came up to the penitent-form, after one
of my West-end services, last season, and told me: "I am a preacher. I
have been laboring in the Gospel for eight years, but I know I am
utterly destitute of this power." "Do you want it?" "Oh!" he said, "I
do;" and he looked as though he were sincere. "Then," I said, "what is
it? There is a hindrance. It is not God's fault. He wants you to have it
He is as willing to give you the Spirit as He was Peter or Paul, and
you want to have it. Now, _will you have it?_ Have you understood the
conditions?" "Ah!" he said, "_that_ is the point." Now, you know I
should be a false comforter if I were to try to make you believe you
were right when you had not yielded that point. "Well," he said, "you
see it would be cutting loose from one's entire circle." Ah! he was led,
you see, by "Christian friends." I said, "Did not the Lord Jesus cut
loose from His circle to save you? and, if your Christian friends are
such that to live a holy life you must cut loose from them, what are you
going to do--stop in that circle, ruin your own soul, and help to ruin
them, or cut loose and help to save them?" Oh! there is no profounder
philosophy in any text in the Bible than that--"How can ye believe who
receive honor one of another, and seek not the honor that cometh from
God only?" You will have to come to God not caring what anybody thinks.
As a dear lady, who is going through floods of persecution for
Jesus, said, "I don't care if they turn their backs on me, and never
speak to me any more, and cast me out, and my children, too. I don't
care if I can only have His presence and follow Him." When you come
to that you will get this pearl.
I know a father and mother who want this blessing,--especially the
mother. They have a family of beautiful little children, but the
father says, "What are we going to do for our children? It is a very
serious matter cutting loose from our circle." A gentleman said to
me, "I have to do _something_ for my sons. What am I to do?"
"No," I said, "you have got to do nothing for your sons. You have to
train them for God, and leave GOD _to do for them_, and He is
well able to look after His own. That is your business; train them
for God, and leave God to find a niche for them, and if He can't on
earth, I warrant you He will in Heaven." People have things wrong way
up now-a-days. They have the notion that they have to do this, that,
and the other, for themselves and their children, instead of
accepting it as their great commission that they have to propagate
and push along and extend the kingdom of Jesus Christ, to seek His
kingdom and His righteousness, and leave Him to look after their
interests. When you come to this it will soon be done.
A FRAGMENT.
Love Him, trust Him,
Him alone;
Father, Keeper,
Three in One.
Saviour, Master,
Leader, too;
Lover, Brother,
ALL to you.
Fear not, care not,
Only follow
His way, this day,
And to-morrow.
Waiting, working,
For His sake;
Watching, hoping,
Till daybreak.
Peaceful, joyful,
In His peace;
Filled full, kept full,
By His grace.