Review and Herald, Vol. 42, No. 11.
SANCTIFICATION; Or the Observations of Forty Years on Christian ExperiencePage 1
Earlier text: SANCTIFICATION; Or the Observations of Forty Years on Christian ExperienceOut of the Back Door.
By T. L. Cuyler
There are two doors in our churches. At the front door new members are received. In revival seasons, this door is thronged with incomers. Some come in hastily, and without good evidences of conversion. And these are ones who commonly disappear soonest through the postern door. For our churches have a rear door also. People do not go out through it in crowds; they slip out stealthily, one by one. I never knew of a concerted backsliding from Jesus Christ. Persons often urge the unconverted to repent and come in to Christ; but no one ever urges his fellow-member to steal out of the back door, and become a backslider. The very proposal would shock and alarm. People backslide without urging—and often before they are fairly aware of it themselves. That church which during the last year has had more travel through the door at the rear, than through the door of ingress, has gained a loss. They had better begin the New Year with a day of humiliation and prayer. Backsliding is usually a gradual process. It is not a bold, sudden leap, but a series of slow and almost imperceptible slips. “Christian” and “Hopeful” first grew discontented with the straight road to Heaven, and found the footing rather rough. Then they looked over the stile into the soft, velvety “By-path Meadow.” It promised easier walking. They flattered themselves that the meadow ran close alongside of the King’s highway of holiness. So after looking over wistfully, they concluded just to step over for a little while. But that crossing of the stile cost them a kidnapping by Giant Despair, and a wretched imprisonment in his dungeons, by which they were only delivered by deep repentance and the key of prayer. That wise man, Bunyan, describes only one door of admission into the Christian life, but the gateways of egress are very numerous. So our churches have only a single door of admission, but there are a great many posterns through which deserters slip out. One professor begins to neglect secret prayer. If he keeps up the form, he loses the spirit of devotion. Presently he drops off from the social prayer-meeting. A slight excuse suffices to quiet his conscience. “The meetings are growing dull,” he whispers to himself. “A sociable,” a concert, a sleighing-party, the opera or almost anything that promises a lively evening, draws him away. He drops quietly out of the back-door, and gets fairly over into the ranks of the pleasure-seekers before he is aware. The number of professing Christians who owe their spiritual declension to sensual temptations is larger than is supposed. When a young man begins to desert from his post of duty, I soon suspect that the dance, or drinking-cup, or secret licentiousness is at the bottom of it. The besetting sin soon becomes an over-match for him; and if he does not quit his sinning, he will very soon quit his praying. The backslider who slips out the door to gratify fleshly lusts, always intends to go “just this once” and then return again. But a person rarely commits one deliberate sin, and stops with that single transgression. When the devil fairly gets hold of a church member, he does not let go his grip so easily. But back of all outward backsliding lies the decay of religion in the heart. Our heart must be in our religion, and our religion in our heart, or else it becomes an uphill drudgery, or a sheer hypocrisy. Here lies the secret cause of many a church member’s desertion. He has not heart for his religious duties. They are a downright penance. He tugs at them awhile as a galley-slave pulls at the oar. He goes to his closet, or to the prayer-circle, or to the Sabbath-school, because he must, and not because he wants to. If the church bell rings him to the sanctuary, he hunts an excuse in the weather, or his health, and if none avails him, he goes reluctantly to keep up appearances. Money-giving to the Lord’s treasury becomes a tax, and he submits to it with secret protest. It is not a free gift, but an assessment, like the tax on his house, or his income; he pays it grudgingly. In fact, the whole routine of external service is gone through slavishly and reluctantly, and he shirks everything that he possibly can. As soon as the service of Jesus Christ ceases to be a cheerful, voluntary labor of love, backsliding has begun. It is a mere question of time as to when he shall become an open deserter. His heart is outside of the door, and he soon goes with it. This paragraph will probably reach hundreds of church members who have been stealing away from their duties during the year just closed. Perhaps some of them will lay down this paper, and say, sadly, “Well, this means me. Oh! that I were as in months past!” The man or woman who honestly feels thus, I have some hope for. When there is conscience enough left to feel “pricked” and penitent on account of guilty wanderings from Christ, there is a possibility of recovery. And this is a good time to begin a new life. Upon every backslider’s ear the bell that strikes the incoming of a new year, ought to sound as a most solemn warning from Heaven. This is the right time to repent and do the first works again. This is a good time to give up false hopes and rotten foundations, and to seek a new conversion. Multitudes of church members are living on the mere memory of an outworn experience, or on a faint hope that they were converted long years ago. They are really out of Christ’s fold. “I am the door,” saith the Shepherd’s voice to these wandering sheep. The first step of these wanderers must be to Jesus. By him alone can they re-enter the deserted fold. Backsliding professor! what thou doest, do quickly! Even to thee very soon that door may be shut!—T. L. Cuyler. THE late Rev. S. Pearce, being one weekday evening in London, and not engaged to preach, asked a friend where he could hear a good sermon. Two places were mentioned. “Well,” said Mr. P——, “tell me the characters of the preachers, that I may choose.” “Mr. D——,” said his friend, “exhibits the orator, and is much admired for his pulpit eloquence.” “Well,” said Mr. P——, “and what is the other?” “Why, I hardly know what to say of Mr. C——; he always throws himself in the background, and you see his Master only.” “That’s the man for me, then,” said the amiable Pearce; “let us go and hear him.” Religion Does Not Forbid Rational Pleasure
RELIGION.—Religion interferes not with any rational pleasure; it bids nobody quit the enjoyment of any one thing that his reason can prove to him ought to be enjoyed. It intrenches upon none of our privileges, invades none of our pleasures; it may, indeed, sometimes, command us to change them, but never totally to abjure. REV. DR. MACLEOD (father of the late Norman MacLeod) was proceeding from the manse to the church, to open a new place of worship. As he passed slowly and gravely through the crowd gathered about the doors, an elderly man, with the peculiar kind of wig known in that district—bright, smooth, and of a reddish brown—accosted him: “Doctor, if you please, I wish to speak to you.” “Well, Duncan,” says the venerable Doctor, “can ye not wait till after worship?” “No, Doctor, I must speak to you now, for it is a matter upon my conscience.” “Oh! since it is a matter of conscience, tell me what it is; but be brief, for time presses.” “The matter is this, Doctor. Ye see the clock yonder on the face of the new church. Well, there is no clock really there—nothing but the face of the clock. There is no truth in it, but only in the twelve hours. Now, it is in my mind very wrong, and quite against my conscience that there should be a lie on the face of the house of the Lord.” “Duncan, I will consider the point. But I am glad to see you looking so well; you are not young now; I remember you for many years; and what a fine head of hair you have still!” “Eh, Doctor, you are joking now; it is long since I have had my hair.” “Oh! Duncan, Duncan! are you going into the house of the Lord with a lie upon your head?” The Doctor heard no more of the lie on the face of the clock. Trusting God Rather Than Self
You cannot trust self too little, nor God too much. A gentleman of high standing in the State of ———, a lawyer, a politician, a man of talents, and, as the world estimates, a man who was successful in all his undertakings, was suddenly arrested by disease, and soon brought to the close of life. As it was evident he could live but a few days, he was asked by a friend how he felt as he looked back upon his past life. And the answer, coming from a man of sense and thought, with eternity full in his view, was striking and memorable: “With all its success, I now see and feel that my whole life has been a failure! I have not gained one of the great ends for which life was given, and now it is too late to gain them!” What a thought, what a feeling, what a prospect, for the hour when life is closing, and eternity is to be entered, and character and destiny and state are to be forever fixed! What a lesson to impress on us right views of the great ends for which life was given, and to lead every one so to live here as to be preparing for the life beyond this world! “Life a failure!” God does not design it to be so. As in early days we look forward to its coming scenes, we do not desire or intend it to be a failure, but only a success. And yet there is but one way to success, but one way to make sure of the great ends for which life was given; and that is to be guided by God’s truth, walk in the way that he points out, rest our hopes on his mercy, and be consecrated in heart and life to his service. Thus we may form the character we shall wish to endure, and make sure of results in which we shall rejoice forever in Heaven! I’ll Take What Father Takes.
“WHAT will you take to drink?” asked a waiter of a young lad who for the first time accompanied his father to a public dinner. Uncertain what to say, and feeling sure that he could not be wrong if he followed his father’s example, he replied, “I’ll take what father takes.” The answer reached the father’s ear, and instantly the full responsibility of his position flashed upon him. And the father shuddered as the history of several young men, once promising as his own bright lad, and ruined by drink, started up in solemn warning before him. Should his hopes be blasted, and that open-faced lad become a burden? But for strong drink they would have been active, earnest, prosperous men; and if it could work such ruin upon them, was his own son safe? Quicker than lightning these thoughts passed through his mind, and in a moment the decision was made. “If the boy falls, he will not have me to blame;” and then in tones tremulous with emotion, and to the astonishment of those who knew him, he said, “Waiter, I’ll take water;” and from that day to this, strong drink has been banished from that man’s home. OFTEN ask, Will this glorify God. The morning breaks in cloud, the rain is falling
Upon my pillow; still I sigh for rest,
But yet I hear so many voices calling
To work, by which my burdened soul is pressed,
That I can only pray,
“Strength for the day.” ’Tis not a prayer of faith, but weak repining,
For with the words there comes no hope, no light:
In other lives a morning sun is shining,
While mine is but a change from night to night;
So while I weep, I pray,
“Strength for the day.” For it is hard to walk in constant shadow,
Climbing with tired feet an uphill road;
And so, while my weak heart dreads each to-morrow,
And I once more lift up my heavy load,
Desponding still, I pray,
“Strength for the day.” Now looking back to the long hours ended,
I wonder why I feared them as they came;
Each brought the strength on which its task depended,
And so my prayer was answered just the same.
Now, with new faith, I pray,
“Strength for the day.” For in the one just closed I’ve learned how truly
God’s help is given equal to our need;
Sufficient for each hour it cometh newly,
If we but follow where his teachings lead,
Believing, when we pray,
“Strength for the day.” He who has felt the load which we are bearing,
Who walked each step along the path we tread,
Is ever for his weary children caring,
And keeps the promise made us, when he said
He’d give us, all the way,
“Strength for our day.” A clergyman of eighty mentioned, not long ago, that he had derived more benefit from the advice of an aged minister when he was but fourteen years old than he had ever received in his whole life. The good man had recommended to him most strongly that, in whatever circumstances he might be placed, he should never permit a day to pass without reading a chapter in the Bible. Through his long life he had endeavored to follow this advice, and the blessing it had been to him he could not estimate. Now he repeated the advice, enforced by his own example, to all his young friends. We are often at a loss what direction to give to the young who are willing to inquire into the way of life, and have very indefinite notions as to what they shall do. We are always safe in sending them to the Bible. Urge them to read it much. Teach them to pray for the Holy Spirit to light up its pages. I think no person who will sit down daily and prayerfully to the reading of the New Testament, really wishing to become a Christian, will long remain unconverted. Let us teach our children early to read it every day; and to choose some “golden text” for the day’s guidance. Thus we may bring the Bible into the every-day concerns of life, and make it in reality what it should be, the family guide-book in the journey of life.—S. S. Times.