If ever there was a day when it was important for every professed follower of Christ to stand fast and to be true to his profession, I believe it is the present day. There is no answer to infidelity like the life of Christ displayed by the Christian. Nothing puts the madness of the infidel, and the folly of the superstitious more to shame and silence than the humble, quiet, devoted walk of a thoroughgoing, heavenly-minded, divinely-taught Christian. It may be in the unlearned and poor and despised; but, like the scent of the lowly violet, it gives its perfume abroad, and both God and man take notice of it.
In the experience of almost every believer, there is some turning point, when he either goes onward in devotedness to the Lord, or sinks down into a mere common-placed Christian. Not one of us is too obscure to be tried as to whether we will seek God’s honor, or present things, first.
God is very jealous of all man’s substitutes and imitations of the power of the Holy Spirit. In stripping ourselves of such things, we may seem to others to be throwing away our influence and our usefulness. But what is usefulness? What is “doing good?” It is doing the will of God.
“Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.” Romans 12:2