SUNDAY READING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9178, 6 October 1888, Page 4 (Supplement)

SUNDAY READING.

ARE YOU A CHRISTIAN [by REV. GEORGE F..PENTECOST, D.D.] " Brother, cannot you come and help us in the inquiry-room ? We have more inquirers to-night than we have workers." This request was made by me of a middleaged gentleman who was seated with a lady, whom I took to be his wife, in the body of the church where the principal service had been held. There were always a good many Christians who remained to the after-ser-vices not to work, but to hear what more might be said, especially the final words addressed to inquirers, in which I endeavoured to make the way of life very plain. I took this man to be one of those Christians who were ever learning, and never fully coming to a knowledge of the truth, yet fearful that something might be said or done that he did not want to miss. To my request, he replied,, " Oh, you must excuse me ! I can't do that." " Why, vou are a Christian ; are you not?" " Well, I hope I am ; but I could not undertake to talk to anyone about his soul. I would not know what to say." "Just tell them how they maybe saved. Point them to Christ, and explain the way of salvation to them." " But that would be my trouble. I don't think I could do that." " Well, my friend, you can at least tell them how you were saved ; how you know that you are a Christian. There is no better way to deal with an inquirer than to tell them just how you have come to know that you are a Christian. You can't do that without opening up the way of salvation." " But, Mr. Pentecost, that is just my trouble. I am not sure that lam a Christian. I do not know certainly that I am saved." " I am sorry to hear you say that, my brother. Do you not profess to be a child of j God?" "Oh, yes, I am a professing Christian; but lam not sure that lam a real one. I would give a good deal to be sure on that point. I have been a member of the Church tor twenty-five years, but I do not think I have ever had what you call assurance. I have tried to live as nearly right as I know how; and, though I have made many failures, still upon the whole I have tried to do about right. Yet I am not sure that I am' "a Christian." This was the old story, heard from so many of God's professing children. It is a sad and dreadful thing that so many earnest souls who have confessed Christ and identified themselves with the people of God, go through life anxious as to their real standing with God ; not " knowing for sure" whether they arc Christians or not. I was interested in the man, arid, though much troubled- | for the lack of workers, I decided to spend a few minutes with him, and endeavour to help him to a better apprehension of his salvation in Christ. The lady at his side, whom I supposed to be his wife, had been a very deeply interested listener to this brief conversation, but had not spoken to me, nor had Ito her. I turned now toward her, still addressing the man, and said : ' " Is this lady your wife?" "Yes, sir, this is Mrs. —Allow me to introduce her. Mrs. L , Mr. Pentecost." I acknowledged the introduction with the ordinary salutation ; and said further to Mr. L—-, whose name I had just then learned : " Mr. L , did you say that this lady was vour wife ?" " Certainly, sir," he replied, with a rising inflexion in his voice, as if he were surprisedat my question after what had just passed. " But, sir, are you sure she is your wife ?" " "Certainly, sir; why do you ask such a question?" . " But are you sure she is your wife ? Have you no doubt on that point " Of course I have no doubt on that point; but I do not understand you, Mr, Pentecost. Please explain." " Well,' I replied, in a somewhat careless tone of. voice, you have just told me that you have been a professing Christian for twenty-five years, and that you have in all those years tried to live a Christian life, but that you are not sure whether you are a Christian or not, though you have publicly taken upon you the professions and obligations of a Christian life. I did not know but that you might be in the same state of doubt as to whether you were really the husband ,of this excellent lady, with whom you have no doubt been living for a good many years in this sacred relationship." The man seemed a little dumbfounded, and a little disposed to be angry with me. He replied : f ' I certainly do not understand the drift of your remarks. Will you be kind enough to explain yourself, Mr. Pentecost?' 1 " 1 assure you, sir, I mean no offence, either to you or your lady, though I fancy, if you should express the same doubt as to your relationship to her that you do concerning your relation to Jesus Christ, whom you profess to have taken as a Saviour, you would ! feel somewhat hurt."

"I do not understand you. There is no room for any question as to what my relation to my wife is. "You are sure, then, that you are this lady husband, and that she is your wife?" ' Of course I am. I know that I am her husband, and that she is my wife. There is no room for doubt in the matter." "Would you mind telling me how you come to be so positive about it?" " Why, it is very simple; but I do not see the relevancy of this to the subject of our conversation concerning my being a Christian. Twenty-five years or more ago, I met my wife, and fell in love with her. After a while I told her that 1 loved her, and asked her to become my wife. She was good enough to accept me. and in course of time I married her." While telling mo this little matter-of-fact story, he looked toward his wife, and his face was full of affection, and seemed to light up with pleasing memories, and then he added, as he threw his arm lightly across her shoulder, in a kind of half embrace, " I can assure you, sir, that I have never had any occasio to regret the cere*

mony that gave her to me, and I trust that she has not, eh, wife? No, sir; there is no doubt about her being my wife." • " But pardon me, Mr. L , how do you know she is your wife ?" " Why, because we are married to each other, and have for twenty-five years lived together, and loved each other as man and wife." " What do you mean by being married to each other? and how were you married? In other words, how was the relation which now exists between you established?"^ "That was very simply done. . We went to the minister, and told him that we desired to become man and wife, and he asked me if I loved her, and would take her to he my wife ' for better or worse,' and so forth. You know how it is done. Then he asked her the same question. We both answered ' Yesand he pronounced us man anil wife."

" And you have no doubts on the subject? Have never said to yourself since, ' I wish I was sure she was my wife; I love her 'and desire to be her husband 1 but still I am not just absolutely sure of it, though I have always tried to treat her as a good husband should,' and so forth ?" " Certainly not." "Now, my friend, do you not see that in this matter you have the key to assurance as to your relation to Christ? Christ loved you, and gave Himself for you, though you were in no wise worthy of His love. He sought you by His Word and Spirit. He asked you to become His in a living relationship, which He likens to that which exists between man and wife (Knh. v., 25, 26, 30, 33), and y'ou considered His proposition of love and salvation, and publicly accepted Him as your Saviour and Lord. Now, does not God's Word assure you that„ so doing, you are saved?" I read to him Rom. x.', 9; John v., 24; vi., 47; and several other passages of like import, and said to him further : If God was sincere in giving His Son to die for you, and Jesus was sincere in saying that whosoever conieth unto Him' would in no wise be cast out, and you were sincere in accepting Him as your Saviour, then you have the Word and oath of God (Heb. yi., 17, 18, 19) that you are accepted of Him and saved by Him. Whether you believe the Word of God to be true, and have sincerely and honestly accepted Jesus as Saviour and Lord, is a question which you only can answer. I leave you to think it over. Goodnight, sir; good-night, madam." I left them, and went about my work among'other inquirers. The next evening I saw the same couple sitting about in the same place. Mr. L called me to him after the sermon, and 1 was surprised to find him with an eager, happy, almost triumphant look upon his face, and, •when he spoke to me, it was with a, voice full of emotion. " Mr. Pentecost, I want to thank you for your talk with me last night. It is all plain to me now. I cannot tell you what gladness and peace have come into my heart. I scarcely slept last night for joy. My wife and I went home, and we took the Bible, and looked up all the Scriptures you pointed out to us, and found that it was just as you had told us. Ido not see why I have never seen this before. It must be true. It is true. I have been very sinful all these jears . to doubt His Word. My difficulty and great mistake have been that I have been trying to find evidences in myself instead of looking simply to the love of God in Christ, to His finished work, and to His sure Word. I think I can never doubt any more." -hesitated a moment, and then said : "If there is anyone whom you think I' can help, I am more than willing to try. I can at least tell them that I know I am a Christian." j His wife testified to the same gladness, and similarly offered to enter into the work ! of the Lord. Here were two excellent people who had for a quarter of a century been serving, or trying to serve, the Lord, amid much doubt and fear, who might have been leading joyous, happy, useful, and fruitful lives, had thev been more simple-minded and taken God at His Word. I fear there are great multitudes in the household of God who, from a like mistake, are in doubt as to whether they are Christians. Would to God they might deal with Him more simply, believe and act upon His Word, and not seek to find in themselves witnesses aud testimonies which can never give them assurance, even though the inward experience is of the Spirit. Let us remember that it is the finished work of Jesus only that constitutes the ground of our acceptance with God, and that it is the written Word, energised by the Spirit, that gives us the warrant or assurance I of salvation. GOD'S SUCCESSIVE STEPS.' j At the recent Keswick Convention the Rev. Herbert Brooke took as the basis of one of his addresses Psalm exxxi., 1, "Lord, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty," and the other two verses of the Psalm. He remarked at the outset: —You must go through Psalm exxx. before you can understand Psalm exxxi. Let us make sure of taking God's order. These Psalms are "among the songs of degrees. Psalm exxxi. is one ot those songs of deliverance with which the Lord compasses about his saints. There are plenty of them for God's people. There is a song of deliverance after and before every battle—a song before you light, then After.God has fought for you. Jehoshapliat praised God before the battle, the enemy fell down before them, and they had only to take the spoil. It is a song of degrees, or of goinzs-up, or of steps. There are steps indicated in the three verses of the Psalm, and we must take that one step before we can take the other, and observe God's order." It is the song ef degrees of David, tile man after God's own heart. If any man wants to know how to be a man after God's own heart, let him learn here the steps. The first thing to learn is that it is the man who can say, " Lord, my heart is not haughty." Lord —it is not something we say to our selves, and lay sweet unction to ourselves; it is not a blowing of our own trumpet to the Church at large, or" a friend about us ; but it is what we say to the Lord, and Him alone, " Lord." It comes about by a change in the soul, indicated in verse 2: "Surely I have behaved and quieted myself, as a weaned child." In the margin it is my soul." The soul must get right before the walk or behaviour gets right. Now, let us consider what it is that David has got rid of in his soul. It is pride. Pride is the first of the seven things that God hates. He abominates pride. Remember what He says about pride in His Word. Mr. Brooke went over a great • number of these in a striking way. _ Summing up, he said there are four things of which people are proud. There is the pride of race, the -pride of place, the pride of face, the pride of grace. As to pride of race, there is'not an "old Jewish pedlar in the streets that hits not got a longer ancestry than any of you can boast, and he bears it in his face, too. It is better to take God's place in the matter. All spring from Adam, and your neighbour has as much right to be proud of his blood as you have of yours. As to pride of place, some think they have more right to that as partly due to their own toils and labours; they nave made themselves. An American said to one who said he was a self-made man, " When you were about it, why did you not make yourself prettier ?" All you made of yourself you are dependent on God for. " What hast thou that thou hast not received ; wherefore dost thou boast?" Pride of place— is .a ridiculous thing ! Then, as tp pride of face, any face is good enough to go to Heaven with. It is not in your looks, we are told, that "God delighteth Himself. Here is a vain thing. God looketh not on the appearance, and He wants to keep His people from these things of pride. Then as tc pride of grace, the worst of all. There are plenty of hor rible stories about that. Let us get rid of that in all its forms. You cannot be proud of anything God give you, without that moment coming under condemnation. It is an abomination to God.

HOW WE LEARN. Great truths are dearly bought. The common truth, Such as men give and take from day to day, Comes in the common walk of easy life, Blown by the careless wind across our way. Bought in the market, at the current price, Bred of the smile, the jest, perchance the bowl; It tells no tales of daring or of worth, Nor pierces even the surface of a soul. Great truths are greatly won. Not found by chance, Nor wafted on the.breath of summer dream ; But grasped in the great struggle of the soul. Hard buffeting with adverse wind and stream. Not in the general mart, 'mid corn and wine; Not in the merchandise of gold and gems ; Not in the world's gay hall of midnight mirth; Nor 'mid the blaze of regal diadems. But in the day of conflict, fear, and grief, When the strong hand of Cod, put forth in might. Ploughs up the subsoil of thy stagnant heart. And brings the imprisoned truth-seed to the light. Wrung from the troubled spirit in hard hours Of weakness, .solitude, perchance u. pain. Truth springs like havests from the well-ploughed field, And the soul feels it has not wept in vain. H. BONAR.