SUNDAY READING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11686, 22 June 1901, Page 4 (Supplement)

SUNDAY READING.

FAITH BY CONSECRATION, OR CON

SFCRATJON BY FAITH? [.UY KKV. GKOItGE BOWK.V] It is a great mistake, and unfortunately not an uncommon one, to represent consecration as something that us; precede faith. in a lecture on "The Christian Life," we find consecration defined as an entire, unreserved, unconditional, and irreversible surrender of ouraeives, body, soul, and spirit, to Cod.' 'Ibis is a tremendous thing to impose on a poor creature who is seeking deliverance from life-long habits that lead him captive, and without the faith that summons logins aid the power of God. 'I he writer proceeds to says : — Consecration and faith are necessarily and inseparably connected, as heat is to ngul in ihe sun. Consecration when true and full must in; followed legitimately by faith. In fact, it can have no force whatever without faith, not being thereby efficiently developed into any life and power. Faith therefore implies and necessitates previous consecration. The degree of ihe one is the measure of the other. Whatever is imperfect and limited in consecration keeps back with it the faith, which, of course, can never be exercised until the soul knows, beyond poradventure, that it is altogether iiie Lords." _ '"Non-consecration utterly prevents faith." "Consecration brings the soul out of its Egyptian bondage and darkness. It disclaims all lojalty to the Pharaoh of sin in the soul. It locks to God for an open way through the sea of doubt, fear, and trial. It is the Moses of tho soul that calls down the manna, that strikes the rock. it becomes a Joshua to lead tho affections across tho Jordan." "Because of it God comes down and dwells within the soul, tabernacling with it, when faith abides, receiving and cherishing the divine life. Faith thereby is fed and grows strong." "Just in proportion to one's consecration will be the height, depth, length, and breadth of his faith.' "You cannot rind a river filling up its channels unless you find its sources steadily overflowing." " Why do not those who desire to have a full faith exercise it? Theirs is not a full consecration. A partial consecration admits only of a partial faith. You come to, God with only a limited gift— you can have then only a limited faith." Now our study of the Word of. God leads

,]■. to reverse thi- description, and assign to faith whit « hero assigned to consecration. The. writer correctly say* that consecration and faith aie in -onie sense (onnected; hut. ■is we undernaud i:, ou- ion iteration is rietcrminwl by our faith, not the latter by ".ho former. *' Without faith it is impossible to please Rod." .Salvation i< -of faith that it might bo by gnw," -~.., unpurchased, i.he free gift o! Goc , , , We knew v. :::... who was ardent. y seekius; i ( > enter on a life c,f faith, and who, misled bv Mich statements as « ' have quoted, was continual 1 ..' trying to r•■.:i*ei-r.ito himself, to m-ike himself over, body and soul, to Cod,, to bo His -° ,;l ' ; '-' and eternity, but was constantly uiadf .o rcalivj that not the least change i'» his state was aceomp.tshcd by U eso> stern endeavour's. At length, in utter despair of himself, in absolute helplessness, lie fell at the feet of Christ, nd told Him plainly that he abandoned all expectation ••mi intention of olioctins any change in him",df told the Lord not to expert anything from him but unbelief ami hardne-? of icart, ami added tint if the Lord wished to see i-i him anv good thing lie must put it ia him The very moment that he tu.ly and intei'i'-i-n'lv readied this point all difficulty vanished; the power of the Lord became icimodmtclv available for ban for all Me exigencies of his nature, and he rejoice, with my unspeakable, not merely because Christ was c-ji.sciou.-iy his, but because he had discovered the V.es-ed secret of intercourse '~:, Christ— simple, unmixed faith. Hie door of tiie bent opened by faith, the love of Cod was shell abroad by the Holy Ghoi'.t cieen unto him; and that love constrained him to use till bis powers in don- the will of Cod. The parly whose experience we have hera outlined had boon converted some time nofore, and had no doubt of his acceptance with God, and of the pardon of his sins. But ho saw a life of faith, peace, joy, victory described in the New Testament, which was quite beyond his experience: and it was this life that tie was seeking to obtain when our sketch begins. As we have received Christ .Jesus tho Lord, so walk we in Him, i.e., always by faith in Him, not in ourselves.

We have known others engaged in a similar search who, under instruction iisvvn, very carefully and with great endeavours consecrated themselves to God, and thou, believing that what they had done had made it possible for them to receive tho grao-> of God, looked to the uplifted Christ for he blowing. In some good hour, beli >\ iff. they receive; the love of Cod is shed ah, oo.d in their hearts by the Spirit of God. Now tho temptation arises to look upon their act of consecration as having greatly contributed to their acquisition of the blessing; in fact, they find in it an evidence that they were rightly taught to regard that act as a sine qua non. Henceforth they join in teaching that the grace of Cod may not bo experienced without lhi«. What is tho result ? Spiritual pride in themselves. Misjudgmoafc of others. Censure of those who are not capable of this heroism. A terrible stumbling-block to seekers who are profound!;/ conscious of their own weakness and faintheartedness, and who weary themselves in crying to God for power to do what they are so incapable of doing, and what God does not want them to do, and who, not getting it, fall into life-long wretchedness or into scepticism. " This is tho work of God, that ye believe on Him whom Ho hath sent." The love of God in the heart will make it a very easy and natural thing to give yourself to Him without reserve. This is God's method.

We hear a great deal about putting our all upon the altar, and about the altar sanctifying the gift. Without faith this cannot bo done. Faith must open the door of the heart that divine love may come in; then wo readily present our bodies and our all a living sacrifice. Whatever is done without faith only needs to bo tested, and its hollowness will become conspicuous. But faith cannot spring up in the heart while wo are occupied with ourselves, with something that wo arc to do. Faith cannot possibly he produced except as our attention is given to the Object of faith. looking unto Him, i.e., to the Scriptural account of Him, wo see that all that we lack, all that we have in vain been seeking for in ourselves, in our own efforts, all that cur natures and our circumstances demand is in Him, and that receiving Him wo roceive all things that pertain to life and godliness. Seeing this, wo believe, we receive, we yield ourselves to God. Christ, by one offering, hath for ever perfected them that are sanctified. Let the- reader go carefully through the Epistle to the Hebrews, and he will see that there is a contrast drawn between tho dispensation under which gifts and sacrifices had to be offered and the dispensation of grac3 which speaks of {lie one offering, made once for all. We are sorry to say that a good deal of what is called holiness literature is vitiated by the admixture of the error wo have been describing. "The grace of God that bringeth salvation (bringing to us fie power of the Holy Ghost adequate thereto) hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world."

THE PREACHER AND THE MESSAGE [BY KEV. J. H. JOWETT, M.A., BIHifINGHAM.] 1. The preacher, What is ho ? Behind the Now Testament word there are half a dozen in the original. The preacher is a herald, a public crier, a man with an imperial proclamation which ho has to announce from the housetop with all the urgency of a sovereign command, an evangelist with a message almost like a song laden with tenderness, a logician, and a conversationalist engaged in fireside speech with his fellow-men. We have to gather these together to describe

" a preacher of the Gospel." 2. What is his function? "Whosoever shall call upon the name of tho Lord shall bo saved. How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed ? and how shall they believe in Him whom they have not heard '! and how shall they hoar without ■>. preacher V (Rom. x. 15, 14). Reverse the order—preaching, hearing, believing, calling, saving What are the two extremes of the series?—preaching, saving. Tho object of all preaching is the salvation of men from si.), from hell, from infirmity, from moral stimtedness, and from spiritual immaturity. 3. Do we keenly realise the horrors of th bondage from which we seek to deliver men Docs sin any longer fill us with poignant pain ? Has it shod any of its loathsomo-

I ness? We do not like some of the bald, ! bare, sharp, rugged, jagged words in which our forefathers described sin. We are busy | filing and smoothing them down, and 1 am | afraid of the change. "A Fountain filled i with Blood." f myself do not like the j elaboration of the figure, and there are many ; to whom the words are almost offensive; but 1 want my dislike to bo safe. if £ 1 drop the particular phraseology I want to ] letain the tremendous" sense of sin behind it. | 4. Does that sense of sin pervade our I ohing '; Do my people have the idea ■ that 1 am dealing with, trifles or with anI palluig enormities? (Refeuing to the inEtiuctions given to the man clothed in linen I with the inkhorn by his Ezekiel ix.) i How many of our FOREHEADS WOULD r.K MAHKKD ? j "That sigh and that cry" for the sin of the j people—is it that with you? i- it that ] with mo? If we do not feel the heat of ■ ihe consuming presence of -in, there will be I no vehemence in seeking to pull mer .is | brands from the binning.' The first step to ; an awakened mini-try is a •deeper conscious--1 ness of sin. I 5 Are wo possessed of a spirit of sensitive j sympathy ? When the Apostle Paul enumerates the graces of the Christian life, ha I puts first that of compassion. A heart full j of pity is part of the essential equipment of j the true preacher of the Gospel of Christ. . 6. Is the wooing note present in our minis- ' try? Is not our preaching too uniformly I severe? Is there not too much that savours i of the judgment scat, and too little that is i fragrant with tho winsomeness of the fireI side? We want less scolding and more teni derness, to drive less and to have more conj straint, "Constrain them" (R.V.), woo them, | "to come in." Every good preacher is a j wooer. When I turn to the Old Testament, I even there the wooing note is not absent. j .Stern Amos sometimes lays aside his thunder : and becomes a woer. Ilosca is a wooer from ; the beginning to the em!. Isaiah can lay all else aside, and say. " Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people." Ho was a great wooer. THE LOVER WILL SUCCEED. 7. Has our preaching the New Testament , emphasis ? I did not put this first, because , I did not want even to seem to suspect my ! brethren. Ido not think my ministerial | brethren are far away from the great and ; cardinal verities of " the Christian faith. I Wherever the Apostle has to proclaim a great \ and imperative duty, it always finds its roots ; very near to Calvary. He drives all his ! tluti-js home with the power of the Crucified Christ. Dave we that emphasis in our I preaching ? Is the dynamic just as clear : when we present an ideal ? Do we link ; our imperatives to the power of the Gospel I of Christ ? j 3. Do we appreciate our own message ? j Do Ave look- as if we revelled in it ? Nothing ! will so tempt our people into tasting and | seeing how gracious the Lord is as to let , them sen we revel in the diet. Delight is contagious, enthusiasm catching. "Thy ! Word is sweet." When we say that, do ;we look a.s if we knew it ? Do we say j that . wit, * sour face'.' -Mv meditation |of Him shall be sweet." When our people I see that we rev«il io our diet thev will try [ our food.