HOW SHALL WE SPEND THE LONG WINTER EVENINGS?
By W. S. Sadler
Pure and Undefiled Religion.
“Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.” James 1:27. In all our efforts to reach our neighbors and influence them for good, let us seek to carry out in our daily lives this pure and undefiled religion. According to James, pure and undefiled religion does not consist in singing psalms, giving Bible readings, or even in conducting formal prayer-meetings. He describes it as being that religion which visits the orphan and the widow in their affliction, seeking to help those in need. The true service of God consists in helping others, in seeking to strengthen the hands of the weak, in ministering to the necessities of the poor, instead of ever seeking to feed and strengthen ourselves. Pure and undefiled religion gives of its riches to others. Whether it be by cottage meetings, Bible readings, personal or public effort, that we seek to reach our neighbors, one thing is necessary—that we so relate ourselves to them that they will discern in our lives the exemplification of the principles and the truths we preach in our meetings. In sickness, poverty, and distress let us ever be found ministering to both the spiritual and the physical needs of our neighbors. A kind deed during sickness, a small effort at some other time, may prove an entering wedge by which the truth may find standing room. In the last great day this one question, whether we have or have not ministered unto Jesus in the person of his needy children, will determine our fitness to be admitted into, or our desert of being44debarred from, the eternal joys of heaven. “Christ declared, ‘The poor always ye have with you.’ He has plainly stated that the decisions of the last day will turn upon the question of PRACTICAL BENEVOLENCE. To have ministered to the hungry, the stranger, the naked, the sick, are the credentials which will testify that we are Christ’s disciples. ‘Thou hast been faithful over a few things,’ he says, ‘I will make thee ruler over many things.’ How closely Christ has linked himself with suffering humanity! In reckoning with his heritage he places himself on the poor man’s side, and registers any neglect to the poor as done to the One to whom man belongs by creation and by redemption; and every act of self-denial, performed to help the suffering, he acknowledges as done to himself. ‘Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.’”—Review and Herald, No. 28, 1899. Christ, in his efforts to demonstrate to the world that God is love, came to this world and actually loved us, even to the death of the cross. Love is real; and if it exists in our hearts, it will be ever outgoing, seeking to benefit those with whom we come in contact. Again, it is in doing this very work of spiritual and physical ministry that we keep ourselves unspotted from the world. He who is kept busy ministering to the needs of his fellows has little time for idle thoughts and trifling conversation, or for finding fault with his brethren. It is the time which we fail to spend in the works of pure and undefiled religion that we spend in picking flaws in our fellows. “The truth which is not put into practice loses its power. Opportunities which we have failed to grasp will condemn us. The souls which we have left in darkness will reproach us. The future can hold in store but little real happiness for him who has been unfaithful to his stewardship or opportunities. In the final review it will appear that what we have done for man is in reality what we have done for God.”