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A Higher Up
Religion - part 2
by
General
William Booth
Originally printed in, The War Cry, No.4 -
Jan.17, 1880
Reprinted in,
Holiness
Readings.
A selection of Papers on the Doctrine, Experience, and
Practice of Holiness,
Salvation Army Book Depot,
London,
1883.
Our theme is
holiness. We speak
to those who hunger and thirst after righteousness.
You are the children of God.
You have passed from death unto life.
Your sins are forgiven you, and you know it.
A great change has passed over you.
Once you were the willing slave of sin.
Sin in some form reigned over you, but the Saviour
came, and He brought not only pardon but liberty.
You were made free.
You are free to-day.
Hallelujah!
Still, the work of deliverance is not complete.
True, the absolute triumphing reign of evil in your
soul has come to an end, but it is still there.
The Philistine still dwells in the land, and the
enemies who once had it all their own way still disturb your
peace. At times
they overcome you, bring you into condemnation, and threaten
totally to subdue and bring you again into bondage.
We need not enumerate those enemies.
You know them only too well,-anger, malice, pride,
envy, lust, and the like.
All the land, that is, all your heart and life was once
their own, and fain would they have it back again.
You have had many a fight with them, and, I fear,
suffered many a defeat, which defeats have had to be followed
by tears of bitter repentance and fresh applications to the
cleansing-blood.
Oh, ten thousand thanks for the continued efficacy of the
crimson fountain, and the never-failing willingness of Jehovah
to forgive.
His mercy,
indeed, to those who seek it endureth for ever.
And the next best thing to not stumbling and falling
down is, I suppose, to get up again, and the next best thing
to not falling into sin is to repent and seek forgiveness.
But is there no other way?
Yes, we show you another and a more excellent way.
It is according to God’s plan and nature to forgive
sin, but it is none the less according to His plan and nature
to save from sinning.
He is able to keep us from falling, and He is able to
make us stand, and not only to stand but to run and not be
weary, to walk and not faint.
Bless His dear name.
For is not His name called Jesus?
And was not that name, which signifies deliverance,
given to Him because He should save His people from their
sins? Yes, He
saves from sin down here, in this very evil world; He saves to
the uttermost; He saves fully; He saves, He saves to-day.
This is the
experience, dear reader, we want to set before you, and to
prevent misunderstanding we pursue the line of remark started
last week. We left
off at the statement that there was no position so exalted
down here as to free us from temptation.
Adam and Eve were tempted, and, beyond controversy,
they were without sin.
Jesus Christ knew no sin, and yet satan attacked Him,
and haunted and followed Him as perhaps, he never attacked and
haunted and followed any other being, and that just because He
was the best and holiest and most Godlike being that ever
walked the earth.
The devil saw Him and hated Him, perhaps as he had never hated
a being before.
Hence, he must either have flown from Him or flown at Him.
He flew at Him, but only to be hurled back again and
trampled upon and bruised.
If you are a good copy of your Example, your Original,
he will see the resemblance, see it before anyone else, and he
will feel something of the old hatred and fly at you.
But as He, your Master, overcame, so may you, so shall
you, if you are a faithful soldier, and you shall sit down
with Him on His throne even as He has sat down on His Father’s
throne. But
remember that resemblance to Christ, rather than saving you
from temptation, will only the more certainly bring it upon
you.
THIS IS NOT AN
EXPERIENCE SO HIGH UP THAT YOU WILL BE SAVED FROM INFIRMITIES.
– We came into the world with minds and bodies diseased and
deranged as the result of sin.
Our fathers, a good way back, have eaten sour grapes,
and the children’s teeth have been set upon an edge.
We reap – in our imperfect memories and damaged
perceptions and emaciated and diseased bodies – the result of
their transgressions and also of our own.
Hence, mentally, we are prone to make mistakes all
sorts of mistakes; while, bodily, the worship we give and the
service we render to the Great God of Heaven is marred and
disfigured. But
these infirmities cannot justly be accounted sins.
I cannot condemn myself for what I cannot help.
If I have a crook in my leg or a twist in my eye, no
power can make me blame myself for my limping gait or my
defective vision.
They are infirmities and not sin – infirmities which render my
service all imperfect contrasted with the pure service of
perfect beings, but which imperfection is more than met and
covered by the all-atoning sacrifice of my Saviour.
The requirements
our loving Father make upon his children are graduated to
their ability. If
I am strong I must serve with my strength, if I am weak,
according to my weakness.
If I am wise I must serve with my wisdom, if I am
ignorant according to the little light I possess.
If I have ten talents I must use every one of them, if
I have only one that one must be made the most of for His
glory and the good of souls.
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart.” Therefore,
whether it be a big heart or a little heart, so that it be
laid on the altar and filled with His love; whether in this
sense it be a perfect or an imperfect heart, He will be
content. The work
may be very imperfect, but if the eye has been single and the
intention pure, if the worker has been perfectly offered and
sprinkled and accepted, God will be pleased and satisfied, and
say, amidst the plaudits of angels, “Well done, thou good and
faithful servant.”
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