Bible Review V15: October 1916 - March 1918 - Iapsop.com

1917 CONSECRATION OF SELF 409
Many persons will answer: "But I do not; I have no confidence
in men, for they have so frequently deceived
me." But remember, dear ones, that prayer is the
sincere desire of the heart; and if you desire love,
sympathy,
friendship or approval from man, that is prayer,
the desire of the heart. In that you are continually
praying to your fellow-man. And when you try to promise
absolute obedience to God and his Spirit's guidance,
and something within you rebels, causing you to fear to
promise entire obedienceto the Spirit, lest you should be
required to do something that would bring criticism upon
you from your fellows, you have demonstrated within
yourself that you are praying more sincerely to man
than to God. The commandment says, "Thou shalt not
bow down thyself to them nor serve them," but you are
daily and hourly bowing down to them and serving them,
and wilfully disobeying God, and how can you expect
his Spirit's guidance or approval under such circumstances?
You could not expect it from a dear friend in
the earth life, how much less from God.
Jesus said, "Ye can not serve God and mammon."
No wonder
The
true Christian life is a narrow walk, and very few are
found therein.
Now consider these thoughts, and examine your own
soul, and do not say that you have made that covenant
with God until you-the real self-have also made it. It
is not made when you decide in your own reason to do so
-not until the soul has made it.
Let us examine the pre-requisites in a
concentrate
form: lirst, to desire more than all else in life and among
men to KNOW the will of God; second, to promise from
the soul-yes, and with a yearning desire-to DO
will, regardless of what any person may say about you,
or what it may cost you or bring upon you in any way.
To reach this point you must shut the door to all human
his