Can that twisted life be put right?
There is only one answer: "O Lord, Thou knowest, I don't." Never trample in with religious common sense and say-- "Oh, yes, with a little more Bible reading and devotion and prayer, I see how it can be done." This is nonsense!
It is much easier to do something than to trust in God: we mistake panic for inspiration. And works which are to be done by Him alone are being done by our own
two hands without Him, yet for Him by our own strength and efforts. We must be willing
to wait on Him.
Are you willing to die with Him? Why, not? Is it something about you that is dear to you?
That is why there are so few fellow workers with God and so many workers for Him.
'They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their pleasures while they feast with you.' 2 Peter 2:13
17These men are springs without water and mists driven by a
storm. Blackest darkness is reserved for them. 18For they mouth empty, boastful
words and, by appealing to the lustful desires of sinful human nature, they
entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error.
We would far rather work for God than believe in Him.
Am I quite sure that God will do what I cannot do? I despair of men in the degree in which I have never realized that God has done anything for me.
Is my experience such a wonderful realization of God's power and might that I can never despair of anyone I see? Have I had any spiritual work done in me at all? The degree of panic is the degree of the lack of personal spiritual experience.
"Behold, O my people, I will open your graves."
When God wants to show you what human nature is like apart from Himself, He has to show it you in yourself. If the Spirit of God has given you a vision of what you are apart from the grace of God, you know there is no criminal who is half so bad in actuality as you know yourself to be in possibility.
"My 'grave' has been opened by God and I know that in me dwelleth no good thing." God's Spirit continually reveals what human nature is like apart from His grace.
Are you avoiding God's Spirit?
19They promise them freedom, while they themselves are
slaves of depravity—for a man is a slave to whatever has mastered him.
20If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and overcome, they are
worse
off at the end than they were at the beginning. 21It would have been
better for
them not to have known the way of righteousness, than to have
known it and then
to turn their backs on the sacred command that was passed
on to them. 22Of them
the proverbs are true: "A dog returns to its vomit,"
and, "A sow that is washed
goes back to her wallowing in the mud."
Lord send down Your advanced formula, to which deeply cleans and resists dirt and evil stains. Show me what it means to 'remain' Amen
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