“Are you not only sorrowful because of your divided
affections but now wholeheartedly determined to fear the name of God?
Has God ever cast you into His furnace? Has His Word, like
fire, taken a hold on you and refined your impure spirit so the unbelief,
pride, hypocrisy have been made visible and been separated like dross from
gold? Only then are you free to sever sin from your soul and confess what a
wretched person you have been, even though your spiritual condition appeared
attractive in man's eye. Do you grieve to recall the religious pageantry you
produced for the community in the name of Christ while you privately
entertained lusts inside the locked dressing rooms of your heart? But, even
more vital, are you not only sorrowful because of your divided affections but
now wholeheartedly determined to fear the name of God?
Do you have just one design, to love Christ and be loved of
Him? If the mighty power of God's Spirit has renewed your heart and gathered
your affections into this one channel, and caused you to run to Him with sweet
violence, then you are greatly blessed of the Lord. Mountains and rocks of
corruption may surface in your stream to hinder the free course of your soul as
it rushes to God; but even with these windings and turnings to block the most
direct way to Him, sincerity-- like water to the sea-- will never turn back
until it carries you to Him.
A sincere heart is a simple heart. The hypocrite is bred by
the serpent, and like him, shrinks up or lengthens himself out to his best
advantage, unwilling to expose himself to others. He has good reason, too,
because he has the most credibility where he is least known. Hypocrites
"seek deep to hide their counsel from the Lord, and their works are in the
dark, and they say, Who sees us? and who knows us?" Isaiah 29:15. The
hypocrite's pious words and the evil motives of his heart are miles apart.”
Quoted material from, ”The Christian in Complete
Armour Daily Readings in Spiritual Warfare” by Gurnall and James S Bell.
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