Secret Power; or, The Secret of Success in Christian Life and WorkMoody, Dwight Lyman
Religion
Secret Power; or, The Secret of Success in Christian Life and Work
Moody, Dwight Lyman
Baptism in the Holy Spirit; Christian life; Holy Spirit
Even the vilest, the most impure, acknowledge the power of goodness;
they recognize the fruit of the Spirit. It may condemn their lives and
cause them to say bitter things at times, but down deep in their
hearts they know that the man or woman who is living that kind of
life, is superior to them. The world don't satisfy them, and if we can
show the world that Jesus Christ does satisfy us in our present life,
it will be more powerful than the eloquent words of professional
reformers. A man may preach with the eloquence of an angel, but if he
don't live what he preaches, and act out in his home and his business
what he professes, his testimony goes for naught, and the people say
it is all hypocrisy after all; it is all a sham. Words are very empty,
if there is nothing back of them. Your testimony is poor and
worthless, if there is not a record back of that testimony consistent
with what you profess. What we need is to pray to God to lift us up
out of this low, cold, formal state that we have been living in, that
we may live in the atmosphere of God continually, and that the Lord
may lift upon us the light of his countenance, and that we may shine
in this world, reflecting His grace and glory.
The first of the graces spoken of in Galatians, and the last mentioned
in Peter, is charity or love. We can not serve God, we can not work
for God unless we have love. That is the key which unlocks the human
heart. If I can prove to a man that I come to him out of pure love; if
a mother shows by her actions that it is pure love that prompts her
advising her boy to lead a different life, not a selfish love, but
that it is for the glory of God, it won't be long before that mother's
influence will be felt by that boy, and he will begin to think about
this matter, because true love touches the heart quicker than anything
else.
POWER OF LOVE.
Love is the badge that Christ gave His disciples. Some put on one sort
of badge and some another. Some put on a strange kind of dress, that
they may be known as Christians, and some put on a crucifix, or
something else, that they may be known as Christians. But love is the
only badge by which the disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ are known.
"By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love
one toward another."
Therefore, though a man stand before an audience and speak with the
eloquence of a Demosthenes, or of the greatest living orator, if there
is no love back of his words, it is like sounding brass and a tinkling
cymbal. I would recommend all Christians to read the thirteenth
chapter of First Corinthians constantly, abiding in it day and night,
not spending a night or a day there, but just go in there and spend
all our time--summer and winter, twelve months in the year, then the
power of Christ and Christianity would be felt as it never has been in
the history of the world. See what this chapter says:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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