Quiet Talks on Following the ChristGordon, S. D. (Samuel Dickey)
Religion
Quiet Talks on Following the Christ
Gordon, S. D. (Samuel Dickey)
Christian life; Devotional literature
"We" may go hand in hand now,--His is pierced; I feel the scar where our
hands touch. But we're together at last, _the_ thing He has been working
for. I can feel His presence. I can hear the low music of His voice
within. Thorns don't count here. Oh, yes, I _feel_ them; they haven't lost
their power to slash and sting,--but--with _Him_ so close
alongside!--Wondrous Christ, here I am at Thy feet, Thy glad slave
forever. I'm wholly Thine. It's my own choice. I'll never go any other way
by Thy grace. This is the second bit that comes, the glad surrender of
life to His mastery. Do you know about this? You will, when you've _seen
Christ_.
Then you come to know, without being able to tell just how, that He is
not only _with_ you, but _within_ you. At first His presence may have
seemed as something outside yourself. You were looking away at some One
who was looking at you. And His look at you broke your heart, and made
your will, once so strangely strong in itself, now as strangely pliable to
His as only a strong will can be. But now He is living within you. You may
not be clear just how the change came. But you do know that there's a
something which you come to know is a some One, who is within. His
presence is peace past understanding, but not past appreciation. There's a
longing for His Word, a desire to talk with Him even when you don't want
to ask for something, a deep heart-cry for purity, a burning within to
please Him. These all seem to come from Him, and at the same time to be
satisfied by Himself, even while they remain and increase.
And yet more, while this Presence within seems so quietly real and
exquisitely peace-bringing, there is still the outer presence, the One
whose presence it was at the first that brought all this change. Two
presences, one above, enthroned there; one within, enthroned there; yet
they seem the same, as though one personality with two presences had come
into your consciousness. There's the Lord Jesus above at the Father's
right hand; here's the Holy Spirit within at my right hand,[120] yet in
practical effect they are as one, while one's thought is always directed
to the Lord Jesus both within and above.
The Presence within makes you think wholly of the Presence above, who yet
seems also to be within. You are getting a taste of the practical meaning
of the Trinity now, three that in effect are as one. But you are too much
taken up with the gladness of it to think about the metaphysics of it.
He--whether within, or above, or both--is so much more than words. The
experience is so much more than any explanation. You are not concerned
about the explanation so long as you can have the sweet experience.
The Final Goal.
This is the third bit that comes when you've seen Christ, the gracious
indwelling of the Lord Jesus' other self, the Holy Spirit. But if you have
seen Him, you are probably not counting steps nor analyzing processes, but
just singing a bit of joyous praise to Him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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