Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1914-07-09

or ignorantly. All faithful children of
God should use all diligence in keep
Ing their garments free from blemish.
This may be done by daily thinking
nbout the robe, and nightly asking the
Lord to remove each spot-to forgive
each failure made that day. The blood
of Jesus Christ keeps cleansing all
who ask that they be cleansed
This is the Heavenly Fathers ar
rangement for His children. He de-
sires them to walk circumspectly,
watching where they tread. Thus they
learn every detail in respect to their
own imperfections. No one can live
for even one day without trespassing
upon the perfect Law of God; for by
nature we are all imperfect In heart
the child of God does not sin: the New
Creature does not sin. 1t is merely
that the flesh is weak. But we have
the comforting assurance of the Scrip
ture that IF any man sin, we have an
Advocate with the Father Jesus
Christ the Righteous" Our Lord ia
there to make good with the Father for
all the Adamic weaknesses.
The Pastor then discussed two kinds
of sin. one Of which he declared to be
forgivable and the other unforgivable.
If to any extent the mind consents to
the deed. to that extent the sin is will
full. Then only that portion which was
not wilful will be forgiven. Whatever
part was not forgivable is punishable
The individual will receive stripes,
punishments, of one sort OF another,
proportionate to the degree in which
the will consented to the sin.
There is naturally such sympathy be-
tween the flesh and the mind that some
times even the will of the New Crea-
ture permits the flesh to take it by
force. as it were. This should not be;
its carelessness will receive stripes of
some kind But so long as the indi-
vidual feels sorry as soon us the yield
ing to temptation has passed, he may
know that his will does not love sin.
Should his will ever change and pre-
fer sin. he would not be sorry after
the sin was committed
How to Be an Overcomer.
1t was then shown that every con-
secrated child of God must be an over
faith, and in obedience to God must
put down everything that pertains to
sin and unrighteousness in himself,
md stand for that which is pleasing in
the sight of God. This is the test of
our loyalty to Him and to the princi-
pies of His righteous Government.
Many sins are really weaknesses of the
tarily. Just here the New Creature
must conquer in the fight He must
get the victory over the flesh II we
sin, if we trespass, we must go to the
Fountain of Grace and be forgiven.
The great difficulty. the Pastor de-
clared, seems to be that after we have
had some experiences of this kind, we
properly enough feel ashamed that we
have not done better This is the
| time when the Christian is in danger.
He is liable to fail to ask forgiveness
ut the Throne of the Heavenly Grace;
| for he feels that already he has been
forgiven perhaps many times for the
same trespass. Therefore he may try
to forget the spot, to forget the robe"
almost to forget the Lord. Gradually
IL veil comes between him and God;
the Father is not so near and so dear
as once He was While He is still his
Heavenly Father. while still the erring
one trusts in Him. nevertheless there
is Il lack of the fellowship of the Spir-
it. Earth-born clouds have hidden the
Fathers face.
This is the experience of hundreds of
the people of God; for they cannot be
in His presence with spots upon their
robes, and they do not resolve that
they will not live away from Him.
They cannot have fellowship with the
Lord while their robes are spotted, nor
can they have proper Christian life
while absent from the Lord The les
son on this point. the speaker declar-
ed. is that we watch and keep humble
To come to the Lord and say, 20 Lord
another time have failed How
ashamed ami" is to take the right
step Humility is one OF the very
foundations upon which all other
graces must be built. SO the Apostle
, Peter says. Humble yourselves there
fore under the mighty hand of God
that He may exalt you in due time"
The Cleansing Blood of Christ.
The number of those without spot OF
wrinkle or any such thing is very
small. said the Pastor Many Chris
tians have not kept their wedding robe:
with sufficient care. and thus hav,
shown their lack of appreciation of til,
wedding and of their invitation to at
tend If the attention of such be call
ed to the spots, they try to put then
out of sight, to ignore them. to decl.r,
that everybody has spots on his robe
This is an unwise procedure: for til,
robe is our passport into the Kingdom
= If the spots are not removed. the,
gradually become wore and more
!. hindrance to those who seek TO be &C
counted worthy of a place in the Bird