I HAD learned that Christ had died for my sins according to the Scriptures. But though I had the sense of pardon, I had not deliverance from this present evil world; but was mixed up with its pleasures, its dancing and concerts, when the Lord put a stop to it all. I was all dressed for a large party. Mother and our servant girl had pronounced the word “perfection,” when it was found that I had half an hour to spare before the auto would arrive.
Thanks be to God for that half hour! I dismissed my assistant, and having locked my door, knelt down in prayer. Rising from my knees I stood before the mirror, and felt ashamed before the Lord. I took up my Bible; it opened at Romans 8, and my eye caught these words, “who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” I again stood before the mirror, when in an instant every part of my costly attire—each ornament, each piece of jewelry—seemed to speak—all joined in one common chorus, “After the flesh! after the flesh!”
For a moment there was a conflict. The coming scene, the brilliant ballroom, the gay, cheery companions—all had their charms, and at that moment they pressed strongly on my heart. Again I turned to my Bible.
“There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.”
All the love, the grace, the forgiveness, the kindness of God, seemed wrapped up in that little word, “no condemnation"; and all that it cost His own Son to secure for me that “no condemnation": His death of agony, His being forsaken of God, seemed all to unfold from that little word, "in Christ Jesus,” and filled my soul with such a sense of God and His grace, that the conflict was over in a moment.
With a quiet joy, impossible to describe, I began to disrobe. I put off every ornament and all my costly attire. I put them off before the Lord—I put them off forever. When my relatives came in, they found me robed in a simple evening dress! I told them how God had spoken to me through His Word, and read the Scripture to them. It was a sore blow to my friends; but from that hour my whole life was changed; and, through grace, I seek now to live not unto myself but unto Him “who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” Gal. 2:20.
“The ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.” 1 Peter 3:4.
Perhaps you may say, dear young Christian, “I do not go to dances,” but stop and think over your daily life. Are there not ways that you my following, which you know are not pleasing to the Lord, which if weighed in His presence, you would be ashamed of? We beg of you, to lay aside everything that is not in keeping with Him and His glory. The one walking with the Lord only has a happy path, and the prospect of hearing His “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.”
“He died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him which died for them, and rose again.” 2 Cor. 5:15
Is He not worthy?
ML-07/03/1960