Testimonies for the Church Volume 1 - A New You Ministry

We’ll be there,we’ll be there in a little while,We’ll join the pure and the blest;We’ll have the palm, the robe, the crown,And forever be at rest.*****Chapter X - Withholding ReproofAbout this time I was subjected to a severe trial. If the Spirit of God rested uponanyone in meeting, and he glorified God by praising Him, some raised the cry ofmesmerism; and if it pleased the Lord to give me a vision in meeting, some wouldsay that it was the effect of excitement and mesmerism. Grieved and desponding, Ioften went alone to some retired place to pour out my soul before Him who invitesthe weary and heavy-laden to come and find rest. As my faith claimed the promises,Jesus would seem very near. The sweet light of heaven would shine around me, andI would seem to be encircled by the arms of my Saviour, and would there be takenoff in vision. But when I would relate what God had revealed to me alone, where noearthly influence could affect me, I was grieved and astonished to hear some intimatethat those who lived nearest to God were most liable to be deceived by Satan.According to this teaching, our only safety from delusion would be to remain ata distance from God, in a backslidden state. Oh, thought I, has it come to this, thatthose who honestly go to God alone to plead His promises, and to claim His salvation,are to be charged with being under the foul influence of mesmerism? Do we ask ourkind Father in heaven for bread, only to receive a stone or a scorpion? These thingswounded my spirit, and wrung my soul with keen anguish, well nigh to despair. Manywould have me believe that there was no Holy Spirit, and that all the exercises that holymen71