By J.R. Miller
Every true Christian should desire to be Christlike in character. It is not enough to be honest, and upright, and true, and just. In Christ, these strong qualities were marked--but He was also gentle, and kind, and loving, and patient. If we would be like our Master--we must have these traits of character also in us. When we pray that the beauty of the Lord may be upon us, we must ask for these finer features of His beauty--as well as for the more rugged ones. We need His strength and truth and faithfulness and justice--but we need His love and tenderness as well. And these are among the fruits of the Spirit-filled life.
"Alice is not pretty," said one of her friends, trying to define her character, "and I never heard anybody call her brilliant. But you couldn't put her anywhere--in the poorest, narrowest place--without finding in a little while that things had begun to grow about her. She could make a home in the desert, and not only would it be a home, with all the warm, welcoming feeling of one--but there would be fine, invisible lines stretching out from it to the world in every direction. I cannot imagine her in so bare a place, that she could not find joy in it; nor in so lonely a place, that the sorrowing and troubled would not find their way to her door. She has a gift for living--that's the secret."
That is the way the Spirit works in the heart in which he dwells. He opens a well of heavenly love there and its waters make the life into a garden of God. The beauty in us changes us from glory to glory, until all the grace and beauty of Christ are in us. Not to admit this heavenly Guest--is to be without God. To have him in our hearts--is to be children of God.
The influence of the indwelling Spirit is not shown merely in holy emotions, ecstatic raptures--but in most practical ways in everyday life. To be kind and charitable, to give bread to the hungry and to sacrifice a pleasure to help another over a hard place, are better evidences of the indwelling of the Spirit than any amount of effervescent talk about consecration, in a prayer meeting. To be honest on Monday, to keep a house beautiful on Tuesday, to pay one's debts on Wednesday, "to kiss a bumped forehead" on Thursday, is worth more as proof of the indwelling Spirit, than a whole hour's rapturous experience on Sunday, which ends with the day. God in us, means God in all our common life.
The Spirit in us gives us power for service. The apostles were bidden to tarry at Jerusalem until they were clothed with power from on high, before they would go out to preach. The world was perishing and the redemption was ready--but the messengers could not deliver their message effectively, until the Spirit had filled their hearts. We should note well this condition of power. We talk about organization, about machinery, about the church and its institutions. All this is important--but the essential power after all, is the Spirit of God. At the opening of a Methodist General Conference the bishop in charge prayed: "We thank you that we have machinery. Fill it with divine power." We must have good workers--but the best workers can do nothing unless the Spirit of God works in them.
It is a beautiful illustration of this truth which Bishop Brooks gave: "Look at the artist's chisel. Most certainly it carves the statue. The artist cannot carve without his chisel. Yet imagine the chisel, conscious that it was made to carve and that that is its function, trying to carve alone. It lays itself against the hard marble--but it has neither strength nor skill; it has no force to drive itself in; and if it had, it does not know which way it ought to go. Then we can imagine the chisel full of disappointment. 'Why cannot I carve?' it cries. Then the artist comes and seizes it. The chisel lays itself into his hand, and is obedient to him. That obedience is faith. It opens the channels between the sculptor's brain and the hard steel, and thought, feeling, imagination, skill flow down from the deep chambers of the artist's soul to the chisel's edge. The sculptor and the chisel are not two--but one. It is the unit which they make, which carves the statue."
We are but the chisels to carve God's statues in this world. Unquestionably we must do the work. Our hands must touch men's lives and bless them. Our lips must speak the words of life by which sinners shall be convicted, the penitent pointed to the Lamb of God, the sorrowing comforted, the discouraged heartened. The mother, the teacher, the friend, must carve the soul of the child into the beauty of Christ. But the chisel alone can do nothing. The artist must hold it. We must lay ourselves into the hand of the Divine Spirit, that his power, his wisdom, his grace and love may flow through us.
Our danger always is that we may fail to recognize the necessity of the Spirit in our work. We think that we can help people, that we can change bad lives into good, that we can comfort sorrow, and that we can put touches of beauty upon human souls. One fact is that we can do nothing alone. Then the other fact is that we can do all these things if we are clothed with the power of the Holy Spirit. Without the Spirit we cannot do them. The Spirit will not do them without us. These blessed and beautiful ministries can be wrought, only when we are filled with the Spirit--and the Spirit works in us and through us.
So we must yield our lives to the Spirit and to guard most carefully that nothing is ever allowed to hinder or obstruct the Spirit's working in us. It is not easy to let God into our lives. We naturally love this world, and it is easier for us to yield ourselves to the spirit of the world than to the Spirit of God. Too many yield their hearts to the Divine Guest on Sunday, and then on Monday let in again the old worldly guests who drive out the Holy Spirit.
We all know how easy it is to lose out of our hearts--the gentle thoughts and holy desires which come to us in life's quiet, sacred moments. We sit down with our bible in the pure, sweet morning, and as we read the Master's words it seems as if angels from heaven had come into our heart. We hear words of love. Desires kindled by the love of God warm our heart. As we read and pray and meditate, it is as if we were sitting in the gate of heaven and hearing the songs of the holy beings inside. But half an hour later, we must go out into the world, where a thousand other voices will break upon our ears--voices of temptation, voices of pleasure, voices of care, the calls of business, of friendship, of ambition--not all holy voices; many of them calling us away from God. How shall we carry with us all the day through all these distractions and all these allurements--the holy thoughts and feelings and desires of the morning watch?
The spirit of the world is fatal to the stay of the heavenly Spirit in a heart. The world is very subtle. We try to make it seem harmless--that we may keep it in our hearts. We need to ask our friends to pray for us no more greatly at any time--than when we are prospering in worldly ways. It is no easy task to keep our hearts filled with the Spirit of God, while we are busy all the time with the world's affairs.
If we would keep the Spirit always in our heart, we must make our heart's life heaven-like. We must live ever near to Christ, doing always the things which please him. One of the special days in the calendar of many Christians is Whitsunday--White Sunday, because anciently it was the custom for many Christian to wear white garments in toke of their purity. Let every Sunday, and every week-day, too, be a time for putting on the white robes of righteousness, as is befitting those who have received the Holy Spirit. Always we must wear these same white robes; down into the city streets, back to our work. We need to guard our white garments with most gentle care--that we get no stain or soiling on them.
It is no wonder that gentle spirits sometimes shrink from going away to meet the world's dangers. "I send you forth as lambs among wolves," said the Master. But if we keep the Spirit in our hearts, there will be no danger. Our safety lies in having this blessed Guest always in our hearts!
