Your ShelfYour Projects

Two Falls

13%

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Oct 26, 1905

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 82, No. 43.

Read the full edition

Two Falls

By T. E. BOWEN

T. E. BOWEN
We are in a land where it is not a very unlikely thing, nor anything very uncommon, to stumble and fall. Even a good man sometimes trips on some stumbling-stone that the enemy conceals in his path, and in consequence receives a serious fall. Everybody feels ashamed of himself when he falls. One needs usually at such a time not so much censure, as to be helped up with some such comforting word as “Never mind,” “hope you are not hurt.”
But these spiritual falls—they are also real experiences. All Christians have them. Some small, insignificant thing upsets them, and down they go. But instead of jumping up and going on, brushing the unfortunate experience aside, it often occurs that some get into the habit of considering it a virtue to sit and bemoan the sad fall, eliciting sympathy from passers-by, and hindering every one coming that way to inquire into their sad experience. This is folly, and the sympathy given those who thus make no effort to arise, is certainly misplaced.
But the fall. That good men fall in their heroic efforts to overcome is plainly revealed in the Scriptures, and the difference between their fall and that of a wicked man's is very marked indeed. “The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord: and he delighteth in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand.” Ps. 37: 23, 24.
What a wonderful assurance! When a good man falls, he simply stumbles and falls into God’s hand underneath him. But when a wicked man goes down, his fall is great; for underneath are not the everlasting arms.
None of us can boast in that we fall not, but in this passage is revealed the secret as to how it comes that the fall of one does not prove his utter ruin, while, when another stumbles and falls, he riseth not again. One is walking in a path God has ordered for him, the other is in one of his own choosing; one has underneath the hand of the Infinite, the other trusts in no higher power than himself. One will gain the city of God, the other will not.
Rome, N. Y.