The Christian's Secret to a Happy Life

Chapter 8 Difficulties Concerning Guidance. You have now begun, dear reader, the life of faith. You have given yourself to the Lord to be His wholly and altogether, and you are now entirely in His hands to be moulded and fashioned, according to His own divine purpose, into a vessel unto His honour. Your one most earnest desire is to follow Him whithersoever He may lead you, and to be very pliable in His hands, and you are trusting Him to work in you to will and to do of His good pleasure. But you find a great difficulty here. You have not learned yet to know the voice of the Good Shepherd, and are therefore in great doubt and perplexity as to what really is His will concerning you. Perhaps there are certain paths into which God seems to be calling you, of which your friends disapprove. And these friends, it may be, are older than yourself in the Christian life, and seem to you also to be much farther advanced. You can scarcely bear to differ from them, or to distress them, and you feel also very diffident of yielding to any seeming impressions of duty of which they do not approve. And yet you cannot get rid of these impressions, and you find yourself therefore plunged into great doubt and uneasiness. There is a way out of all these difficulties to the fully surrendered soul. I would repeat, fully surrendered, because if there is any reserve of will upon any point, it becomes almost impossible to find out the mind of God in reference to that point, and therefore the first thing is to be sure that you really do purpose to obey the Lord in every respect. If, however, this is your purpose, and your soul only needs to know the will of God in order to consent to it, then you surely cannot doubt His willingness to make His will known and to guide you in the right paths. There are many very clear promises in reference to this. Take for instance John 10, 3, and 4. He calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out. And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. Or John 14, 26. But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. Or James 1, 5, and 6. If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him. With such declarations as these, and many more like them, we must believe that divine guidance is promised to us, and our faith must therefore confidently look for and expect it. This is essential, for in James 1, 6, and 7 we are told, Let him ask in faith nothing wavering, for he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord. Settle this point, then, first of all, and let no suggestion of doubt turn you from a steadfast faith in regard to it, that divine guidance has been promised, and that, if you seek it, you are sure to receive it. Next, you must remember that our God has all knowledge and all wisdom, and that therefore it is very possible he may guide you into paths wherein he knows great blessings are awaiting you, but which to the short-sighted human eyes around you seem sure to result in confusion and loss. You must recognize the fact that God's thoughts are not as man's thoughts, nor his ways as man's ways, and that he alone who knows the end of things from the beginning can judge of what the results of any course of action may be. You must therefore realize that his very love for you may perhaps lead you to run counter to the loving wishes of even your dearest friends. You must learn from Luke 14.26-33, and similar passages, that in order to be a disciple and follower of your Lord, you may perhaps be called upon to forsake inwardly all that you have, even father or mother, or brother or sister, or husband or wife, or it may be your own life also. Unless the possibility of this is clearly recognized, you will be very likely to get into difficulty, because it often happens that the child of God who enters upon this life of obedience is sooner or later led into paths which meet with the disapproval of those he best loves, and unless he is prepared for all this, and can trust the Lord through it all, he will scarcely know what to do. But these points having all been settled, we come now to the question as to how God's guidance is to come to us, and how we shall be able to know his voice. There are four ways in which he reveals his will to us, through the Scriptures, through providential circumstances, through the convictions of our own higher judgment, and through the inward impression of the Holy Spirit on our minds. Where these four harmonize, it is safe to say that God speaks. For I lay it down as a foundation principle which no one can gainsay that, of course his voice will always be in harmony with itself, no matter in how many different ways he may speak. The voices may be many, the message can be but one. If God tells me in one voice to do or leave undone anything, he cannot possibly tell me the opposite in another voice. If there is a contradiction in the voices, the speakers cannot be the same. Therefore my rule for distinguishing the voice of God would be to bring it to the test of this harmony. The Scriptures come first. If you are in doubt upon any subject, you must, first of all, consult the Bible about it, and see whether there is any law there to direct you. Until you have found and obeyed God's will as it is there revealed, you must not ask, nor expect a separate, direct, personal revelation. A great many fatal mistakes are made in the matter of guidance by the overlooking of this simple rule. Where our Father has written out for us a plain direction about anything, he will not, of course, make a special revelation to us about that thing. And if we fail to search out and obey the Scripture rule where there is one, and look instead for an inward voice, we shall open ourselves to delusions, and shall almost inevitably get into error. No man, for instance, needs or could expect any direct personal revelation to tell him not to steal, because God has already in the Scriptures plainly declared his will about stealing. This seems such an obvious thing that I would not speak of it, but I have frequently met with Christians who have altogether overlooked it, and who have, as the result, gone off into fanaticism. I knew one earnest Christian who had the text, All things are yours, so strongly impressed upon her mind in reference to some money belonging to a friend, that she felt it was a direct command to her to steal that money, and after a great struggle she obeyed this apparent guidance with, of course, most grievous after-results. Had she submitted her leading to the plain teaching of Scripture in reference to stealing, she would have been saved. The Bible, it is true, does not always give a rule for every particular course of action, and in these cases we need, and must expect, guidance in other ways. But the Scriptures are far more explicit, even about details, than most people think, and there are not many important affairs in life for which a clear direction may not be found in God's book. Take the matter of dress, and we have 1 Peter 3, 3 and 4, and 1 Timothy 2, 9. Take the matter of conversation, and we have Ephesians 4, 29 and 5, 4. Take the matter of avenging injuries, and standing up for our rights, and we have Romans 12, 19-21, and Matthew 5, 38-48, and 1 Peter 2, 19-21. Take the matter of forgiving one another, and we have Ephesians 4, 32 and Mark 11, 25-26. Take the matter of conformity to the world, and we have Romans 12, 2 and 1 John 2, 15-17, and James 4, 4. Take the matter of anxieties of every kind, and we have Matthew 6, 25-34, and Philippians 4, 6 and 7. I only give you these examples to show how very full and practical the Bible guidance is. If, therefore, you find yourself in perplexity, first of all search and see whether the Bible speaks on the point in question, asking God to make plain to you by the power of His Spirit through the Scriptures what is His mind. And whatever shall seem to you to be plainly taught there, that you must obey. No special guidance will ever be given about a point on which the Scriptures are explicit, nor could any guidance ever be contrary to the Scriptures. It is essential, however, in this connection to remember that the Bible is a book of principles and not a book of disjointed aphorisms. Isolated texts may often be made to sanction things to which the principles of Scripture are totally opposed. I believe all fanaticism comes in this way. An isolated text is so impressed upon the mind that it seems a necessity to obey it no matter into what wrong thing it may lead, and thus the principles of Scriptures are violated under the very plea of obedience to the Scriptures. In Luke 4 the enemy is represented as using isolated texts to endorse his temptations while Christ repelled him by announcing principles. If, however, upon searching the Bible you do not find any principles that will settle your especial point of difficulty, you must then seek guidance in the other ways mentioned, and God will surely voice Himself to you, either by a conviction of your judgment, or by providential circumstances, or by a clear inward impression. In all true guidance these four voices will, as I have said, necessarily harmonize, for God cannot say in one voice that which He contradicts in another. Therefore if you have an impression of duty, you must see whether it is in accordance with Scriptures, and whether it commends itself to your own higher judgment, and also whether, as we Quakers say, the way opens for its carrying out. If any one of these tests fails, it is not safe to proceed, but you must wait in quiet trust until the Lord shows you the point of harmony, which He surely will sooner or later if it is His voice that is speaking. Anything which is out of this divine harmony must be rejected, therefore, as not coming from God. For we must never forget that impressions can come from other sources as well as from the Holy Spirit. The strong personalities of those around us are the source of a great many of our impressions. Impressions also arise from our wrong physical conditions which color things far more than we dream. And finally impressions come from those spiritual enemies which seem to lie in wait for every traveller who seeks to enter the higher regions of the spiritual life. In the same epistle which tells us that we are seated in heavenly places in Christ, Eph 2.6, we are also told that we shall have to fight there with spiritual enemies, Eph 6.12. These spiritual enemies, whoever or whatever they may be, must necessarily communicate with us by means of our spiritual faculties. And their voices, therefore, will be, as the voice of God is, an inward impression made upon our spirits. Consequently, just as the Holy Spirit may tell us by impressions what is the will of God concerning us, so also will these spiritual enemies tell us by impressions what is their will concerning us, disguising themselves, of course, as angels of light who have come to lead us closer to God. Many earnest and honest-hearted children of God have thus been deluded into paths of extreme fanaticism, while all the while thinking they were closely following the Lord. God who sees the sincerity of their hearts, can and does, I am sure, pity and forgive, but the consequences as to this life are often very sad. It is not enough to have a leading, we must find out the source of that leading before we give ourselves up to follow it. It is not enough, either, for the leading to be very remarkable, or the coincidences to be very striking, to stamp it as being surely from God. In all ages of the world, evil and deceiving agencies have been able to work miracles, foretell events, reveal secrets, and give signs, and God's people have always been emphatically warned about being deceived thereby. It is essential, therefore, that our leading should all be tested by the teachings of Scripture, but this alone is not enough. They must be tested as well by our own spiritually enlightened judgment, or what is familiarly called common sense. So far as I can see, the Scriptures everywhere make it an essential thing for the children of God, in their journey through this world, to use all the faculties that have been given them. They are to use their outward faculties for their outward walk, and their inward faculties for their inward walk, and they might as well expect to be kept from dashing their feet against a stone in the outward, if they walk blindfolded, as to be kept from spiritual stumbling if they put aside their judgment and common sense in their interior life. Some, however, may say here, But I thought we were not to depend on our human understanding in divine things. I answer to this that we are not to depend on our unenlightened human understanding, but upon our human judgment and common sense enlightened by the Spirit of God. That is, God will speak to us through the faculties He has Himself given us, and not independently of them. So that just as we are to use our outward eyes in our outward walk, no matter how full of faith we may be, so also we are to use the interior eyes of our understanding in our interior walk with God. The third test to which our impressions must be brought is that of providential circumstances. If a leading is of God, the way will always open for it. Our Lord assures us of this when He says in John 10.4, And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. Notice here the expressions goeth before and follow. He goes before to open a way, and we are to follow in the way thus opened. It is never a sign of a divine leading when the Christian insists on opening his own way and riding roughshod over all opposing things. If the Lord goes before us, He will open the door for us, and we shall not need to batter down doors for ourselves. The fourth point I would make is this, that just as our impressions must be tested as I have shown by the other three voices, so must these other voices be tested by our inward impressions, and if we feel a stop in our minds about anything, we must wait until that is removed before acting. A Christian who had advanced with unusual rapidity in the divine life gave me as her secret this simple receipt, I always mind the checks. We must not ignore the voice of our inward impressions, nor ride roughshod over them any more than we must the other three voices of which I have spoken. Every peculiarly precious spiritual gift is always necessarily linked with some peculiar danger. When the spiritual world is opened to a soul, both the good and the evil there will meet it, but we must not be discouraged by this. Who would not rather take manhood with all its risks and dangers than remain forever in the ignorance and innocence of childhood? And who would not rather grow up into the stature of Christ, even if it shall involve new and more subtle forms of temptation? Therefore we must not be deterred from embracing the blessed privilege of divine guidance by a dread of the dangers that environ it. With the four tests I have mentioned, and a divine sense of oughtness derived from the harmony of all of God's voices, there need be nothing to fear. And to me it seems that the blessedness and joy of this direct communication of God's will to us is one of our grandest privileges, that God cares enough about us to desire to regulate the details of our lives is the strongest proof of love He could give, and that He should condescend to tell us all about it, and to let us know just how to live and walk so as perfectly to please Him seems almost too good to be true. We never care about the little details of people's lives unless we love them. It is a matter of indifference to us what the majority of people we meet do or how they spend their time. But as soon as we begin to love anyone, we begin at once to care. God's law, therefore, is only another name for God's love, and the more minutely that law descends into the details of our lives, the more sure we are made of the depth and reality of the love. We can never know the full joy and privileges of the life hid with Christ in God until we have learned the lesson of a daily and hourly guidance. God's promise is that He will work in us to will as well as to do of His good pleasure. This means, of course, that He will take possession of our will and work it for us, and that His suggestions will come to us not so much commands from the outside as desires springing up within. They will originate in our will. We shall feel as though we desired to do so and so, not as though we must. And this makes it a service of perfect liberty, for it is always easy to do what we desire to do, let the accompanying circumstances be as difficult as they may. Every mother knows that she could secure perfect and easy obedience in her child if she could only get into that child's will and work it for him, making him want himself to do the things she willed he should. And this is what our Father, in the new dispensation, does for His children. He writes His laws on our hearts and on our minds, so that our affection and our understanding embrace them, and we are drawn to obey instead of being driven to it. The way in which the Holy Spirit, therefore, usually works in a fully obedient soul in regard to this direct guidance, is to impress upon the mind a wish or desire to do or to leave undone certain things. The child of God, when engaged in prayer, feels, perhaps, a sudden suggestion made to his inmost consciousness in reference to a certain point of duty. I would like to do this or the other, he thinks. I wish I could. At once this matter should be committed to the Lord, with an instant consent of the will to obey Him, should the suggestion prove to be really from Him. And then the tests I have mentioned should be intelligently applied, namely, as to whether the suggestion is in accordance with the teaching of Scripture, with a sanctified judgment, and with providential circumstances. Often no distinct consciousness of this process is necessary, as our spiritual intelligence can see at a glance the right or wrong of the matter. But however it may come, when the divine harmony is reached, and the divine sense of oughtness settles down on the heart, then an immediate obedience is the safest and easiest course. The first moment that we clearly see a thing to be right is always the moment when it is easy to do it. If we let in the reasoner, as the Quakers express it, the golden opportunity is lost, and obedience becomes more and more difficult with every moment's delay. The old self-will wakens into life, and the energies that should have been occupied with obeying are absorbed instead in the struggle with doubts and reasonings. It sometimes happens, however, that in spite of all our efforts to discover the truth, the divine sense of oughtness does not seem to come, and our doubts and perplexities continue unenlightened. In addition to this, our friends differ from us, and would, we know, oppose our course. In such a case there is nothing to do but to wait until the light comes. But we must wait in faith, and in an attitude of entire surrender, saying a continual, Yes, to the will of our Lord, let it be what it may. If the suggestion is from him, it will continue and strengthen. If it is not from him, it will disappear, and we shall almost forget we ever had it. If it continues, if every time we are brought into near communion with the Lord it seems to return, if it troubles us in our moments of prayer and disturbs all our peace, and if finally it conforms to the test of the divine harmony of which I have spoken, we may then feel sure it is from God, and we must yield to it, or suffer an unspeakable loss. The apostle gives us a rule in reference to doubtful things which seems to me very explicit. He is speaking about certain kinds of meat-eating which were ceremonially unclean, and after declaring his own liberty, says, I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself, but to him that esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. And in summing up the whole subject, he writes, Hast thou faith? Have it to thyself before God. Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth. And he that doubteth is damned, condemned, if he eat, because he eateth not of faith, for whatsoever is not of faith is sin. In all doubtful things you must stand still and refrain from action until God gives you light to know more clearly his mind concerning them. Very often you will find that the doubt has been his voice calling upon you to come into more perfect conformity to his will. But sometimes these doubtful things are only temptations or morbid feelings to which it would be most unwise for you to yield, and the only way is to wait until you can act in faith, for whatsoever is not of faith is sin. Take all your present perplexities, then, to the Lord. Tell him you only want to know and obey his voice, and ask him to make it plain to you. Promise him that you will obey whatever it may be. Believe implicitly that he is guiding you according to his word. In all doubtful things wait for clear light. Look and listen for his voice continually, and the moment you are sure of it, then, but not until then, yield an immediate obedience. Trust him to make you forget the impression if it is not his will, and if it continues and is in harmony with all his other voices, do not be afraid to obey. Above everything else, trust him. Nowhere is faith more needed than here. He has promised to guide, you have asked him to do it, and now you must believe that he does, and must take what comes as being his guidance. No earthly parent or master could guide his children or servants if they should refuse to take his commands as being really the expression of his will, and God cannot guide those souls who never trust him enough to believe that he is doing it. Above all, do not be afraid of this blessed life lived hour by hour and day by day under the guidance of thy Lord. If he seeks to bring thee out of the world and into very close conformity to himself, do not shrink from it. It is thy most blessed privilege. Rejoice in it, embrace it eagerly, let everything go that it may be thine. God only is the creature's home, though rough and straight the road, yet nothing else can satisfy the love that longs for God. How little of that road, my soul, how little hast thou gone! Take heart, and let the thought of God allure thee further on. Dole not thy duties out to God, but let thy hand be free. Look long at Jesus, his sweet love. How was it dealt to thee? The perfect way is hard to flesh, it is not hard to love. If thou wert sick for want of God, how swiftly wouldst thou move! And only this perfection needs a heart kept calm all day, to catch the words the Spirit there from hour to hour may say. Then keep thy conscience sensitive, no inward token miss, and go where grace entices thee. Perfection lies in this. Be docile to thine unseen guide, love him as he loves thee. Time and obedience are enough, and thou a saint shalt be.