SUNDAY READING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 9775, 23 March 1895, Page 4 (Supplement)

SUNDAY READING.

THE PRACTICE OF THE PRESENCE

OF GOD. [BY REV. F. C. SJPURR.I

We profess to believe in an Omnipresent God, ever near to our side, always ready to help in time of need. Is that so Actions being a fair test of belief, let us review our mode of life, and see whether it is consistent with faith in the real presence of God.

Take the matter of speech to begin with. Let us sit down for a few moments and recall the character of our words uttered during the past week. Memory will be very busy, and most likely will supply us with a list of hasty words, lying words, equivocal words, flattering words, harsh words, and the like. We have uttered words of this class deliberately and freely, and we have been uttering them for years. Do you think they could ever have been uttered if we had honestly believed that God was near by when we spake them ?

Proceed to the matter of actions. Here we enter a larger field; but the same test may be applied. Let us try and summon the actions of the past few days, and looking steadily upon them in the light of truth, ask ourselves if this or that among their number could ever have been performed had we really believed in an Omniscient God. When that clerk falsified the figures in the account book he did so under the impression that he was unobserved. It never dawned upon him as a real truth that God was watching. Yet theoretically he believed in Omniscience. We coufd never be guilty of a petty meanness, or of spreading a false report, or of committing mortal sin, if we realised the fact of the perpetual Presence. Once more let us pep jtrate into the secret chambers of the thoughts and -desires. Here indeed we may test ourselves more accurately than even in the matter of words or actions. Self-respect may detain the impure word prisoner between the lips; fear of discovery may restrain from committing the deadly sin ; but so far as men are concerned we are quite safe in the matter of our thoughts. We may think most wickedly, and they will never be the wiser. But the strongest test of the sincerity of our belief in God comes to us in the region of the thoughts. For it is a religious axiom that " the Lord knoweth the thoughts of men." "He understandeth the thought afar off." He can read our desires as men can read a well-printed book. Now once more let us summon a panorama. — your thoughts for the past days. Well may we blush to behold them as they return. What awful things have peopled the chambers of the mind ! The mental hatred we have borne; the mental pride revelled in; and yet we believe in God, in an Omnipresent Godin a God who is with us day and night. Do we Is not all this abundant proof that the presence of God is not au actual reality to us?

. Now I hope that you are sufficiently interested in the subject to follow me a little further. Is there any way by which the presence of God may be made more real to us? Undoubtedly there is. Let us examine it. Certain saints of the olden time seemed to live in God as their daily atmosphere. The Psalter is full of deep heart-breathings, such as these : "I am continually with Thee •" • Thou art my God;" My soul followeth hard after Thee;" "Lord, Thou art our dwelling-place. _To these men "God" was no vague term, neither a poetic synonym for force. He was a real— living God after whom hearts, panted like thirsty deer. Of all the terms used, perhaps one of the finest is that in Psalm xci.: "The Lord. . . Thy habitation." Ponder awhile until its meaning is burned into your soul. To how many of us is God a "habitation?" Many of us treat Him as a wayside inn— place where we may obtain temporary refreshment, and then pass on. There is an almost infinite difference between an inn and a home ; and God wants to be our home. Those men of the olden time who lived before the Incarnation and the era of the Holy Spirit craved for God, and knew God as their home. It is never safe to build upon any experience, however exalted : the soul wants, and <*nust have a definite pronouncement by God Himself, or there can never be assured peace. What, then, does God propose for us? On the night of the Passion, Jesus, in revealing His choicest treasures to His Disciples, said that, upon the fulfilment of a certain condition, We (Father and Son) will come into Him, and make our abode with Him." In His pathetic appeal to the proud Church at Laodicea, our Lord expresses His desire to come in and sup." St. Paul prayed that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith," and the same apostle actually declared that Christ lived in Him. It is clear as sunlight, then, that the desire of God for each one of -His children is perfect union with Himself, which of course means that His presence will become to us the greatest of all realities. But what practical steps must be taken by the soul in order to realise and practise the presence of God ? There are three necessary things to bo surrender, faith, and recollection.

First, Surrender. God will not force His way into the soul. He only enters upon invitation. He is responsible for the indwelling, we for the admission of Him. Surrender to God is often easier to speak about than to perform. It is not until we begin to face the question that its difficulties fully appear. Hosts of rival claimants that have fattened upon the soul of the inner life rise up in concert, and object to their expulsion from the soul. Forgotten habits become marvellously reanimate, and then the struggle begins. But God must have all, the surrender must be complete. The ears must be closed to the seductive pleas of the intruders, and in thorough sincerity we must say, " Lord, take all, I present myself to Thee a living sacrifice. I belong to Thee by every right* take me and make me all Thine own," This once done, the soul is at rest. Sooner or later : He have all. Do we choose to snrren" 6 ? 10 Him of our will, or must He kindle His fires and burn the stubbornness out of us ? Secondly, Faith. Full surrender to God may be entirely without emotion. There may be no inward sense of our acceptance. It matters little whether we feel the change or not : the thing is to be sure that the will has acted, and faith comes to our assistance first at this point. We may go through some such process of reasoning as the following : —' God wishes to dwell in me and to make His presence the fact of ray life, His one condition being - that I surrender myself utterly to

Him. If Ido this, it is not possible that W. can fail. This, then, I gladly do, and here and now I resign myself utterly to Him ? believe His Word and therefore He' h -? come in to make His abode with me M,, consciousness of it will not make the reality any greater, nor my want of emotion invalidate it. lam to live by faith, not by feeling From this moment my attitude must be quite altered, for God indwells me." Only in way can we proceed at first; later there will be a very real sense of the Divine Presence as the habit of looking to God becomes constant But for this there is required the third thing, *•«., Recollection. Molinos, the Spaniard, who was the first to revive th! forgotten truth of the Divine indwell!™ makes much of "recollection," which hi de! fanes as an inward glance at God." Another writer speaks of it as a " concentration of »n our spiritual faculties within the heart in order to commune with God." RecolWt'^n is the motion of the soul continually summon me iteelf to the practical acting out of the belief that «<"' really is • resident within At first the process may be a little difficult and mechanical, but soon it will become an easy habit, for habit » broken by habit" and the habit of practising the presence of God will conquer all the bad habits that the soul learned in the days of its ignorance and It is not difficult to perceive what a mar vellous change must come to that person who practises the presence of God. Words acnous, and thoughts will be pure and guarded Kfc'farf l 11 be a continual hush in the inner trn'thv 13 n er ?', oubts about God and truth will be blissful impossibilities. Life will be transfigured, Heaven will have begun. " The perfect way is hard to flesh. It is not hard to lore : If thou wert sick for want of God How swiftly wouldst thou move."

"I HAD COME TO BEULAH LAND." I was sitting meditating the other night, on Gods mercy, and love, when suddenly I found in my own heart a most delightful sense of perfect peace. I had come to Beulah « n.u' ere the sun shines without a cloud m S ro ™ W. at calm." I felt a* mariners might do, who have been tossed about in broken water, and all on a sudden, thev cannot tell why, the ocean becomes as unruffled as a mirror, and the seabirds come and sit in happy circles upon the water I felt perfectly content, yea, undividedly harinvnot a wave of trouble broke upon the shore of ray heart, and even far out to sea, in the depths of my being, all was still. I knew no ungratified wishes, no unsatisfied desire I could not discover a reason for uneasiness or a motive for fear. There was nothing approaching to fanaticism in my feelinus • nothing even of excitement: my soul was' waiting upon God, and delighting herself alone in Him. Oh, the blessedness ot this lest in the Lord . What an Elysium it is. I must be allowed to say a little upon this purple island in the sea of my life • i c wa = none other than a fragment of heaven We often talk about our great spiritual storms why should we not speak of our great calms » If ever we get into trouble, what a noise we make of it! Why should we not sing of our deliverances Rev. (J. H. Spurgeon. IN HIS NAME. We find an ally to our faith in the reality of prayer in the fact that it is always seconded by the Lord Jesus Christ. No believer ever Brays alone. In the solitude of African wilds Jr. Livingstone had an Infinite Companion. We have an advocate with the Father. The only beloved Son of God gives His endorsement to the petition of every friend who trusts Him. He to whom all power is given in heaven and on earth re-enforces the appeal of His most lowly follower. He by whom all things have been created adds imperial authority to the words of every suppliant in His name. "In His name" was the password of the Waldenses, by which they recognised one another when all the rest of the world were their enemies. It is the password at which the gates of heaven open to believing suppliants. Must it not invigorate our trust in prayer, as an outcome of almighty power, if we can but believe that when we pray Christ prays? Our thoughts are His thoughts. Our desires are His desires. Our words are His words. They go up to God clothed in the majesty of His decrees. Thus He ever lives to intercede : what can we ask for more ?—Phelps.

THE SUN OF RIGHTEOUSNESS. As shades of night at daybreak disappear. Dispersed before the sun's rays bright and clear; So Christ, the glorious Sun of Righteousness, Shall rise, this sin-benighted world to bless.

Before Him shall the powers of darkness fly, Whose shades of error darken truth's fair sky; Blind unbelief, with all its brood hell-bred, Shall fall, no more to lift its hateful head.

Corruption's pit shall He for erer close ; Oppression's rod shall Him no more oppose; Destruction his dread ravages shall stay : These vanquished, at His feet shall trophies lay Then they that now in shades of darkness sit Shall hail His light, and to His truth submit, And sin's dark, gloomy night shall pass away Followed by ligjjfcof glad millennial day. O, hasten, Lord, that bright, that happy day, When Jesus shall His righteous sceptre sway, When truth and love shall unirersal reign, And earth its Maker's long-lost smile regain. F. H. UOL3IES.